A woman whose newborn daughter became ill after catching a potentially serious respiratory illness is urging other pregnant women to make sure they are vaccinated against it. Jo Goldsmith said she was told to prepare for the "worst" after her daughter Phoebe contracted respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) a few days after being born. The vaccine was not available at the time of her pregnancy, but she said she "definitely would have had it".
"I wouldn't want any family to go through what we went through," she said. Nerys Evans, Deputy Minister for Public and Preventative Health, is also urging people to make sure they are vaccinated against Covid-19, flu and RSV ahead of the winter months. RSV is a common cause of coughs and colds,, external and although infections usually get better by themselves, they can sometimes be serious for babies and older adults, according to the NHS.
RHS vaccinations were introduced in Wales in September 2024. Goldsmith, a children's nurse and health visitor from Haverfordwest, Pembrokeshire, said that when Phoebe was born four years ago, she realised within days that something was wrong. "She was five days old, she had quite a lot of congestion… and we noticed quite quickly that she seemed to be breathing very fast and was struggling," she said.
She said she took Phoebe to hospital and "it escalated from there", with the family told on Christmas Eve that she had RSV positive bronchiolitis. "So, we knew that we were going to be in [hospital] for the Christmas period. But we didn't quite realise how unwell she was going to be." Phoebe soon deteriorated and was admitted to the hospital's high dependency unit, and Goldsmith said her experience as a nurse told her "we were going to be in for a bit of a rough ride".
But she said Phoebe took "her own unique path with it", and "really kept the doctors on their toes". She said that after being taken to a room and shown an X-ray doctors "weren't quite sure which way we were going to go with things". "They sort of prepared us for… the worse," she added.
Phoebe pulled through the virus but did face some longer-term problems, including being admitted to hospital several times with chest problems. Her hearing was also affected. Goldsmith is now calling on others to be vaccinated against the illness, describing the experience as "the most traumatic thing we've had to go through".
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