Four-year-old Deedar is suffering from heart, liver conditions and desperately needs treatment. PHOTO: EXPRESS
Deedar, who is a resident of Badin, has been protesting at the Karachi Press Club for the last two or three months with his father. He can hardly talk, only able to rasp out a few words. "I want to go home, I want to be rid of this disease," he said balefully, turning his face into his father's chest as he sat on his lap outside the press club.
He has been suffering from a condition, either ventricular or atrial septal defect, which, in layman's terms, is a hole in his heart since birth. His liver stopped working properly when he was two years old, which caused doctors to stop his heart treatment. They told his family that they should treat his liver condition first as the organ has stopped making red blood cells, said his father, Jahanzeb Jatoi.
"We are tired of false promises," he said. In the past few months, the chief minister and other government officials took notice of my son's health condition and promised to support me but all they did was take me to the government hospital where, after staying for a month, doctors asked us to take Deedar home as his treatment is not possible anywhere except at the Aga Khan University Hospital, he explained. Jatoi added that the treatment at the Aga Khan University Hospital would cost around Rs1.5 million, which he cannot raise.
"As a citizen of Pakistan, I am demanding proper treatment of my child," he said. "He has the right to live and make his future." Jatoi works at a leather manufacturing factory in Korangi.
Political visit
Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) MPA Khurrum Sher Zaman arrived at the press club to meet Deedar, bearing toys and chocolates, and said the government should take a serious notice of the boy's failing health. Zaman announced that Deedar and his father would be his guests at the Sindh Assembly session today so that Chief Minister Murad Ali Shah and his cabinet members can see his condition and realise that urgent treatment is required to save the child.
While talking to The Express Tribune, he said that if children of the elite class can avail medical facilities abroad, then Deedar has a right to get the best facilities here in Pakistan. He added that no child should die because he cannot afford treatment.
Health minister's version
Health Minister Sikandar Mandhro said that the government has been aware of the child's case since August 5 when he and his father protested for the first time. Mandhro added that he was taken to Jinnah hospital where doctors prescribed him some medicine and asked his father to have him admitted but, after a week, Jatoi took him away from the hospital without informing the staff.
His father has been told by someone that the only hospital that could treat his son is the Aga Khan Hospital, which is incorrect, said Mandhro. He added that if he had stayed at Jinnah hospital, the doctors could have helped him and if a surgery was required, it would have been performed at the government's expense.
"If there is a need, we will even send the child abroad for his treatment but for now the father should understand that he should show up at Jinnah hospital, where doctors and staff have been waiting for him," said the minister. I have informed the chief minister about his condition and government will definitely help the ill child, claimed Mandhro.
Published in The Express Tribune, November 21st, 2016.
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