Party amid cancer fight
Boy, 13, braves pain, celebrates birthday in hospital
JATISH Chand Belas, a blood cancer patient braved the pain as he celebrated his 13th birthday in the children’s ward at Labasa Hospital on February 27, 1984.
A report in The Fiji Times on February 27, 1984, read despite being weak-kneed, he celebrated his birthday in good spirits.
Jatish, who was in the hospital for seven months, could not speak at all but smiled all the time as they cut his cake.
His mother, Sheela Belas said Jatish had become unusually quiet and was fully aware of his predicament. The consultant physician at the hospital, Dr Gopala Krishnan, said Jatish’s illness was incurable, and he had an uncertain future.
Dr Krishnan said the boy’s blood cell decreased in number when he started taking cancer tablets because he had a bad reaction to treatment.
“The treatment was stopped to allow blood cells to increase,” Dr Krishnan said.
Mrs Belas had been living with Jatish in the hospital. She slept on the concrete floor at night and sometimes took Jatish away for the weekends to a friend’s place at Tabucola. Separated from her husband and raising Jatish and her two sisters on her own, Mrs Belas relied on donations as she did not have any source of income.
“The district officer Macuata gave me permission to collect donations and so far I have approached religious groups who had helped,” she said.
Her two daughters were with their father while she looked after the young man at hospital.
She never left her son’s side since he was admitted in July, 1983.
Dr Krishnan said Jatish was having complete blood transfusions every week and that his chances of survival was zero. The transfusions was the only thing keeping him alive.
A separate newspaper report dated February 25, 1984, stated that the children’s ward at the Colonial War Memorial Hospital (CWMH) had received new and restored equipment financed from donations amounting to $3000 which was collected at Ratu Sukuna Park on Australia Day the previous month.
The equipment included radio cassettes, fans, a refrigerator, bed trays, trolleys, folding beds, refurbished beds, and pot plants.
The children were treated to ice cream by the then Australian deputy high commissioner Ken Brazel who had visited the hospital earlier on Australia Day, in the guise of a Sydney koala, and had unwittingly scared the children while he distributed story books.
Without his furry koala costume, Mr Brazel was much more welcomed in the children’s ward, especially with his cartons of ice cream.