Add CategoryTriplet boys have tragically been left orphaned after their mum died from COVID just five months after their dad was killed in a car crash.
Ana Paula Faria made headlines in Brazil when she gave birth to surprise triplets after thinking she was pregnant with twins in 2016.
But the 37-year-old has now sadly died from complications due to COVID at the Santa Casa de Votuporanga hospital – just one week after her younger sister succumbed to the same fate, The Sun reports.
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Ms Faria, who lived in Parisi, Sao Paulo, first developed COVID symptoms last week, but initially tested negative for the virus.
She repeated the test on March 12 and was admitted to hospital after testing positive.
Her condition worsened and she was admitted to intensive care the following day.
She died in the early hours of March 16 due to unspecified complications from the virus.
Ms Faria’s five-year-old triplet sons have now been left orphaned as her husband, Renato Santos, died in a car crash five months ago.
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The children are now being cared for by their grandparents.
Ms Faria’s death came just one week after that of her sister, Karina Angelica Faria, 33, who also died from COVID.
Karina was interned at the Parisi Healthcare Unit and required intubation due to a worsening of her condition.
However, no ventilator was available at the centre, and the hospital in nearby Votuporanga, where her older sister was later admitted, was at full capacity at the time.
Ms Faria, who also leaves behind an 18-year-old son, had previously hit national headlines after she was admitted to the same hospital in Votuporanga to give birth to twins in 2016.
During the childbirth, she learnt from the medical team that she was actually pregnant with triplets, after one of the babies had been hidden behind the other two on her previous ultrasound scans.
She gave birth to the triplets in the space of five minutes.
Radiologist Alexandre Henrique de Parma said at the time: “In general, cases like this are not common, but they can happen.”
This article originally appeared on The Sun and was reproduced with permission