Why do babies, immediately after they are born, seem dead and have a very pale colour ?
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Babies don’t breathe while in the uterus. They get oxygen via the mother’s blood, which passes into the baby from the placenta down the umbilical cord. And they get rid of CO2 from cellular respiration the same way. So mom does the breathing for the baby.
When the baby is delivered, its lungs are full of fluid, and within about 10 seconds the baby takes its first breath. Its heart has been pumping for months in utero, but it has never breathed on its own. It takes the baby’s body a day or so to fully adjust to the “new” way of oxygenating its blood, so that’s why they can have a bluish tinge to their skin – they aren’t oxygenating their cells properly. Unless the baby has a congenital heart defect, it goes away pretty quickly.
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