What to Know
In February 2025, 30-year-old Adriana Smith from Atlanta, Ga. experienced severe headaches while nine weeks pregnant. She received medication from a local hospital and the next day, she was found unresponsive. Due to blood clots found in her brain, according to NPR, Adriana was declared brain dead. In most situations like this, her family would have the option to take her off life support. Because she was pregnant, and due to Georgia laws, Adriana remained on life support with no hope of actually living herself until doctors could safely deliver her baby.
A few days after her son Chance was born, Adriana was taken off life support and pronounced dead. However, as her infant son continues to fight for his life and only slowly recover while in the NICU at multiple hospitals, there are still questions about why Adriana was kept alive as what some call an incubator.
Others, under a TikTok video about an update regarding Chance, have said the entire thing feels like a continued experiment that began when Adriana’s family was forced to keep her hospitalized and on machines when she was medically declared brain dead.
Adriana Smith’s baby is still in the hospital.
@meownstone THEY DESERVE BETTER #adrianasmith #babychance #womensrightsmatter #protectblackwomen #america ♬ original sound – mewnstone 💖✨
In the TikTok video, the user shares updates about Chance and how, at six months old, he is now 11 pounds. But, besides that, he continues to have health problems. And, per the TikTok video, Adriana’s family is footing the bills for everything despite their wishes being that Adriana’s pregnancy be terminated when she was hospitalized.
“If he was doing well, the media would be all over it,” someone commented on the video. “Failed experiment? Crickets.”
Another user added, “They’re just trying to prove they can keep him alive.”
The plan for doctors at Emory University Midtown Hospital was to use Adriana’s body, which had been all but dead following her brain damage, to keep the baby alive and deliver it to term. However, at 25 weeks, they had to perform a C-section due to the baby’s condition inside the womb. This is part of the ongoing debate about why the Georgia laws in place forced Adriana’s family to watch this happen and continue to force it while Chance struggles to thrive.
“Imagine being a child born into this world and used as propaganda,” another user commented under the TikTok. “My goodness. This family is being tortured.”
Because the family is also forced to pay hospital bills, Adriana’s mother, April Newkirk, set up a GoFundMe in June 2025. April often shares updates on Chance’s health, and she has mentioned Chance’s “underdeveloped lungs” multiple times.
On the TikTok about Chance’s health and updates regarding Adriana’s family and the medical bills they are incurring, users are appalled that it continues to go on.
“This whole experiment they have going on is DISGUSTING and to FORCE a dead body to still try to grow a baby and then FORCE the family to pay for it IS BEYOND DISGUSTING AND DISTURBING!” someone wrote.
When Adriana’s mother spoke with 11Alive News in Atlanta, she said that she and the rest of the family wanted the chance to be able to choose to terminate the pregnancy when Adriana was kept on life support. Had they been given the choice, they would have also had the choice to take Adriana off life support.
Therein lies the issue that many people see as the hospital’s experiment of not only seeing if Adriana’s body could continue to keep the baby alive while decaying, but now to see if that baby could live outside of the womb. For now, both experiments prove that there is a lot of suffering involved, and at what cost?
