The First Breath That Finally Counted

In 1952, most delivery rooms treated newborns as an afterthought. Doctors focused on the mother while nurses whisked babies aside, assessing their health with little more than instinct and hope. Dr. Virginia Apgar, an anesthesiologist at Columbia University's College of Physicians and Surgeons in New York, believed every infant deserved better than a glance and a guess. Over breakfast one morning, a medical student asked her how to properly evaluate a newborn.…