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Mrs Ebele Anigbogu was full of joy recently when soccer star and UNICEF Children Ambassador, Kanu Nwankwo, committed himself.....
Mrs Ebele Anigbogu was full of joy recently when soccer star and UNICEF Children Ambassador, Kanu Nwankwo, committed himself during a visit to the Paediatric Ward of the Lagos University Teaching Hospital (LUTH) to sponsor her baby, Lotanna, to Israel or India for a heart surgery.
Baby Lotanna, who is the woman's first child, was diagnosed to have a hole in the heart at LUTH and requires surgery overseas immediately at an estimated cost of N2 million.
Kanu had gone to LUTH to see heart patients and visit the Pediatric Ward with the intention of rendering any help he can, but incidentally there were only two heart patients in the Paediatric Ward, Baby Lotanna and another child, who had to undergo various other treatment before certified ready for heart surgery.
Kanu told Daily Sun during the visit that by his commitment, the Heart Foundation will take up Baby Lotanna's case and speed up his transfer abroad for surgery despite the fact that there are over 2,000 children on the waiting list.
He said: "If we have the support of the states and Federal Government, we will do more. I have the plan but we still need the support. We have over 2,000 babies on the waiting list, Baby Lotanna is now one of them. What we do is, we examine the various cases we have and those whose cases require urgent attention we facilitate their heart surgery immediately with whatever funds are available in our purse."
"I want to help Baby Lotanna. If I am a doctor, I will start surgical procedures on the baby immediately. But I am not a doctor.
What we will do is raise funds to help the baby. If the society, government and corporate bodies can assist the foundation, we will not have over 2,000 babies on the waiting list. It is not a one man thing. If the foundation had all the funds required, all the babies on the waiting list will have their surgeries immediately. But with the funds available to us, we treat as many babies as we can at a time, though as we treat some, more babies keep registering and we can't turn them back. That is why it is a charity. Right now, we have saved 236 babies that had hole in the heart and other rheumatic heart diseases. The more funds we get, the more babies we treat."
"If we get the funds to build a hospital and cardiac centre in Nigeria, we will stop taking these babies outside and have the heart surgery done here because it will be cheaper for us. And that means we will treat more babies and in fact, at that rate, within six months, we can have the over 2,000 babies on the waiting list operated upon. But right now, the cost of flying them abroad for surgery is enormous and it affects the number of cases we handle at a time."
Reacting to Kanu's kind gesture, Mrs. Ebele Anigbogu told Daily Sun that "the baby was born with a hole in his heart. And we've been coming to LUTH for regular check-up. But doctors say the baby needs surgery abroad. As for Kanu Nwankwo's intervention, I am short of words. I don't know what to say, I am happy."
Before visiting the Paediatric Ward, Kanu had earlier paid a courtesy call on the acting Chief Medical Director of LUTH, Prof. Femi Oke and was received in his office in the company of Director of Administration, LUTH, Dr Olusesan Onabowale and Public Relations Officer, Mr Ayo Olagunju.
At the reception Kanu said: "This is actually supposed to be a kind of holiday. But we are using it to go round to say thank you to all the people we have worked with to ensure the success of the Kanu Heart Foundation.
Over time, many people have helped us. At the same time, we are also making visits because you know I am also the UNICEF Ambassador for Children in Nigeria and Africa. So, we are also using this opportunity to do some periodic visit to places where we see children who are struggling. Visit them, give them a few words of comfort and see wherever we can help.
"That is why we are here again. We've been here before, we will continue to be here because by nature, I have been attracted to do such."
Responding, Prof. Oke pleaded with Kanu to put up structures in LUTH that will enable heart surgeries to be done in LUTH instead of going abroad saying that the centre will be named after the soccer star. He said, "I am a cardiologist. When you have a heart problem, most people look at you as if you are about to die. What is amazing is that somebody whom many thought would die because of his heart problem, to pass through all that, climbed to the height of his profession and still come back to help other heart patients, gives much hope. If Kanu can do that, I think more people should do that for our children because they are our future.
"We know you are going to do something for us. Like Oliver Twist, we also ask you to do more in future. Perhaps more in collaborating with us to put up structures that will make us perform those surgeries here instead of going abroad. We've been thinking about this for a long time and we are envisaging a cardiovascular centre. I will love it if my hero, Kanu Nwankwo, will do this for us in LUTH and will name it Kanu Nwankwo Cardiovascular Centre where we can do our surgery, nuclear cardiology, ecotest and with that on ground, it will cut the operational cost by a quarter if not more.
"I've had cause to take people abroad for surgery at the cost of ｣20,000, ｣25,000. How many Nigerians can afford that?"
Reacting to the acting CMD's appeal, Kanu said, "The dream of the Kanu Heart Foundation was put in place to first of all sensitize people and to send heart patients for treatment and secondly, to bring the expertise and technical know-how here.
"The environment is particularly becoming more enabling because we are in a democratic government today. So, such investments are going to come in and we are going to renew our efforts to see how we can source this thing.
'When we bring it home here, the expertise, the training and the machinery, I think these problems will be more alleviated. We are going to work with you more on that, we assure you."