Court orders hospital to treat Zim child (Citizen)

JOHANNESBURG - A North Gauteng High Court judge yesterday ordered the Steve Biko Hospital in Pretoria to immediately recommence treatment of a four-year-old Zimbabwean girl, who is critically ill with a malignant brain tumour. The little girl’s father went to court with the help of Lawyers for Human Rights after the hospital told him his daughter’s treatment had been stopped until he either paid R30 000 or produced proper immigration documentation.

 

Judge Hennie de Vos ordered the hospital to immediately recommence treatment of the child, including chemotherapy and radiation therapy. He also ordered that the hospital  make laboratory test results available to the father for the determination of appropriate further treatment for his daughter. The father said in court papers it was inhumane to put a four-year- old child through such suffering because of an immigration situation not of her own making and over which she had no control.

 

Doctors at the Tembisa Hospital in July last year referred the girl to the Pretoria State Hospital because they did not have the capacity to deal with her illness. She was eventually admitted to the Steve Biko Hospital in July this year, where she underwent surgery to remove 60% of the brain tumour. Her parents were told that the remaining 40% of the tumour could not be removed without worsening the child’s condition and were advised that it could only be treated by chemotherapy or radiation therapy.

Her condition has since improved, but she is  still not able to sit, walk, talk or eat on her own and is being fed through a tube.

 

The girl’s father said he and his wife were people of humble means and could not possibly pay the hospital R30 000.