2026-08-08
Moving abroad with a newborn
Passports, airlines, vaccines, and why the container should not be the plan for the first month.
A newborn can travel when two things exist: a passport, and a doctor who says the baby can fly. Airlines add their own age minimums. Do not buy the ticket first.
If the baby was born in the destination, the local certificate and the embassy passport are the critical path, described in the birth articles. If the baby was born at home, you are carrying a small person plus a file: birth certificate, vaccines started, insurance that covers a baby who is days old, and a paediatrician at the other end.
Housing needs a room that is quiet and a landlord who allows an infant. Shipping cots is slower than buying a safe one on arrival. Do the second.
One adult will not be working at full capacity. Build the landing week around that, with an airport pickup and a kitchen that already has food. Heroics in the first fortnight are how people end up in a hospital for ordinary exhaustion.
