Facebookers, Others Give Rp 1b for Toddler’s Surgery
Anita Rachman | February 09, 2010
Bilqis Anindya Passa in the arms of her mother Dewi Farida, watching coin contributions from the public being counted in Jakarta. (JG Photo/ Afriadi Hikmal) Related articles
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357568The people who donated to this cause. Even if the Indonesian government does pay, I hope you will be repaid in karma. Give yourselves a big hug, you lovely people.
Fantastic story...Congrats to the creators of the FB group and all those who donated, it is so heart warming to see the good side of humanity in the news.
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After Facebook members and donors from the street raised more than the
Rp 1 billion ($106,000) needed for a 17-month-old Indonesian girl’s liver
transplant, the government has said it will pay for the procedure.
Bilqis
Anindya Passa suffers from a rare condition known as biliary atresia,
which is caused by a stumped bile duct. A liver transplant is the only
way to treat the condition, but her parents couldn’t afford the
surgery.
Her cause rallied Facebook users to join the Bilqis Love Coins group, dedicated to fund-raising via the collection of coins.
The
group has so far accrued 98,000 members and raised Rp 1.5 billion for
the toddler in the form of coins, cash donations and bank transfers,
and at donation centers in Jakarta, Bogor, Bandung, Aceh, and Palu,
Central Sulawesi.
“Indeed, the Facebook group made the
greatest impact on this fund-raising effort,” said Citra, Bilqis’ aunt.
“We have the money now. The decision of how and when [the surgery will
take place] will be made on Tuesday [today].”
But on Monday,
Usman Sumantri, the Health Ministry’s head of health insurance
financing, told the Jakarta Globe that the ministry will pay for the
entire operation, including the pre- and post-operative stages. “Yes,
we will cover all the expenses,” he said in a telephone interview.
Citra
said the Ministry of Health had once promised that the government would
cover all the surgery, but “we don’t know yet whether they would really
pay it. But the hospital has so far not charged us anything.”
Bilqis
needs to be intensively treated for about three months following the
surgery. “And she should take medicine for the rest of her life,” Citra
said.
Citra said that if the ministry did pay all the
expenses, the family would use the money to set up a foundation to help
other children with similar conditions.
Accompanied by her
parents and grandparents, Bilqis has been undergoing medical treatment
at the state-run Kariadi Hospital in Semarang, Central Java, since
Wednesday.
Last year a Facebook group collected hundreds of
millions of rupiah — in the form of coins — to rescue Prita Mulyasari,
a mother of two who had been ordered to pay Rp 204 million in damages
to Omni International Hospital over a defamation lawsuit. Thousands of
people collected more than Rp 650 million in coins, three times more
than the ordered settlement.
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