Help us to help
Two-year-old Angela Estrella was born in El Alto, La Paz, Bolivia. As early as the first week of her life, her mother suspected she had a heart defect, as Angela tired quickly and was unable to breathe properly. In April 2014, she underwent her first …
Helen, a single mother, lives with her cousin in the notorious slum of Kibera in Nairobi, in appalling conditions without water or electricity. Her monthly income from casual work (including as a laundress and cleaner), with no fixed earnings, amounts to the equivalent of approximately …
Evan is one of three children living with his family in the Kibera slum in Nairobi. His mother died when he was born, so his father, who works as a humble charcoal seller, now has to look after the family on his own. With the …
Do you remember little Gabriel? Gabriel is the second child of 23-year-old Purity. She lives as a single mother with her two children in the Mathare slum in Nairobi. She and her children survive on the income from odd jobs. When Gabriel was four months …
Caren was diagnosed with cervical cancer last year. Unfortunately, despite treatment, Caren’s body was unable to overcome the cancer. Dottie reports that the cancer could not be eradicated, even after several courses of radiotherapy. Further treatment was, sadly, futile. Caren was subsequently treated at home …
UPDATE July 2015 Victor is happy and, after a long time wearing a compression bandage, is finally ready for his prostheses. Dotty wrote the following on 9 July 2015: Hi everyone, … I’d like to update you on Victor’s recent progress. He’s doing well after …
# Update from 21 June 2015 # Do you remember? Last year, we asked for your help for little Rantohasina from Madagascar: Ranto was a perfectly normal little boy and nothing seemed out of the ordinary. Until the day his parents realised that something was …
Pamela Wasonga died at the age of 35 from an advanced oesophageal tumour. Her three children, aged 7, 12 and 14 – their father having died several years ago – are now living with relatives in Kibera, Nairobi’s largest slum, and face an uncertain future. …
Born into poverty in 2014, subsequently weakened by malnutrition and pneumonia, whilst the underlying cardiac diagnosis of a severe heart defect was made too late in the Kenyan province – sadly, our help came too late for Purity. The heart-strengthening medication helped temporarily, but the …
At the start of last year, we reported on medical emergencies at our partner children’s home, ‘The Nest’, in Nairobi, Kenya: One such emergency involved little Dominic: He had been severely neglected by his mother, who has since been taken into police custody for a …