Pregnant woman medically evacuated after migrant boat rescue in Mediterranean Sea

A pregnant woman who went into labour shortly after being rescued from a migrant boat in the Mediterranean Sea was evacuated by helicopter to Italy on Monday.

Rescuers from the German charity Sea-Watch found the boat in distress packed with 67 people on Monday morning in the Central Mediterranean.

They handed out lifejackets before transferring everyone to the organisation’s rescue ship Sea-Watch 5.

Rescuers soon realised the pregnant woman had rare complications requiring medical care on land for the mother and baby to survive.

They launched a call to close-by coastal states – Italy and Malta – for urgent medical evacuation on Monday afternoon.

Italy eventually sent out a helicopter and evacuated the pregnant woman shortly before 7 pm.

"Italy and Malta deliberately put the life of a woman and her unborn child at risk for hours. This is a political chess game with human lives", said Sea-Watch spokesperson Giulia Messmer.

"We demand safe passages so that no one has to risk giving birth to their child in the middle of the Mediterranean."

The night before, the Sea-Watch 5 crew had rescued six more people in distress at sea. They had fallen overboard and were in the water. All of them were brought aboard the organisation's rescue ship.

Sea-Watch 5 is now on its way to the Salerno port in Southern Italy with 72 people onboard.

Despite an overall EU-wide decline, the Central Mediterranean route has seen about 36,700 irregular crossings in the first seven months of 2025, according to a new report by the European Border and Coast Guard Agency Frontex. This is a 9% increase compared to the same period last year

Libya remains the main departure point, Frontex reported.