11 New Icelanders Born Over Christmas

In the midst of these pandemic times, it’s important to have hope.

Enter a competition to win a box of Grapevine goodies! Just sign up for our newsletter here before 15:00 Icelandic time on New Year’s Eve, and answer the question in the next one.

Case in point: Vísir reports that six babies were born at Landspítali hospital on Christmas Eve, as well as another five on Christmas Day. As Christmas Eve is the traditional time in Iceland when presents are opened, expecting parents were no doubt delighted by their gifts this year.

Not that this is an usually high number. Hulda Hjartardóttir, the chief of medicine at Landspítali’s birthing ward, told reporters that this is a fairly typical number of births. On average, eight babies are born every day on the ward. Over the holidays, however, general practice is not to encourage an expecting parent to give birth if it is not considered necessary.

The state of the pandemic is such that there were a number of parents and relations in quarantine or isolation, but the ward got through it well, according to Hulda.

Undoubtedly at least some of these babies will later come to understand the singular experience of receiving joint Christmas/birthday gifts.