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A newborn baby will typically take its first gasp of air within 10 seconds of emerging from the womb. When Robin Cyr’s baby was born in Halifax just after 3 a.m. last Saturday, it lay motionless for a full 25 minutes.

“My aunt looked at me and said, ‘Your baby girl’s gone,’” Ms. Cyr, 38, told a reporter for Metro Halifax on Sunday.

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Just as hospital staff wheeled the lifeless infant out of the birthing room, however, it suddenly sputtered to life.

Two minutes after the baby was taken away, Ms. Cyr told Metro, “another nurse came over … she couldn’t talk. She was speechless, and another nurse came over and said, ‘Your baby’s breathing.’”

Ms. Cyr could not be reached by the National Post before press time. According to the hospital, she “isn’t interested in doing any more media interviews.”

The peculiar birth occurred at IWK Health Centre, a pediatric and obstetrics hospital in Halifax’s south end. The centre delivered 4,850 babies in 2013, accounting for more than half of all Nova Scotia births.