A team of doctors has flown to Afghanistan after a British servicewoman gave birth to a boy having not realised she was pregnant. Originally from Fiji, the unnamed Royal Artillery gunner is said to have only learned she was about to give birth on Tuesday after having stomach pains. Mother and baby are "stable" in Camp Bastion, Helmand province, said the Ministry of Defence. The woman went to Afghanistan in March and her baby was five weeks premature. A specialist paediatric team from Oxford's John Radcliffe Hospital has left for Afghanistan, RAF Brize Norton has confirmed. The MoD said the team would provide "care for mother and baby on the flight home". It said: "It is not military policy to allow servicewomen to deploy on operations if they are pregnant. In this instance the MoD was unaware of her pregnancy." BBC defence correspondent Caroline Wyatt said it was the first time a British soldier had given birth on the front line although up to 200 servicewomen had been sent home since 2003 from Iraq and Afghanistan when it was discovered they were pregnant. "Military rules ban pregnant servicewomen from front-line duties, though last year another female British soldier gave birth two weeks after returning from her six-month deployment to Afghanistan," she said. One woman went through a six-month tour without realising she had been pregnant. Servicemen and women have pre-deployment medical checks depending on their roles, for example hearing tests, and complete physical fitness tests, such as a five-mile run. But women are not routinely given pregnancy tests.