Bijay, 17, and Nirmal, 13, have been suffering from the disease that kills the patients by the time they are 25 years old, according to doctors. But Man Maya is facing difficulty in saving her children even that long due to lack of blood and donors at the Bharatpur Hospital. [break[
Dr Keshav Bhurtel said patients suffering from thalassemia have to be given blood every 15 days due to lack of blood formation in absence of red blood cells. “They require around six pints of blood per month but are suffering in lack of enough donors,” Dr Bhurtel said.
Twenty-four other thalassemia patients are facing the similar fate while 25 patients of hemophilia, a disease that prevents blood coagulation resulting in uncontrolled bleeding, may also face torrid times due to lack of blood.
Dr Bhurtel said the thalassemia patients have to spend Rs 50,000 to change blood apart from the cost of medicines to make the changed blood functional. He said these patients, who are over 10 years old, are facing difficulty even to live for 25 years due to financial difficulty and lack of donors.
Chief at the hospital’s blood collection center Ramesh Poudel said the patients have been given priority but the center cannot fulfill their need of blood. “How can we give blood to just the patients of thalassemia when the number of donors have gone down in the district,” Poudel argued.
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