WOMAN CAN’T BUY ALL OF SICK MOM’S MEDICINE
In first talk, US raises Taiwan, HK, human rights; China warns vs confrontation
While working in a farm in Bacolod City in 2018 to provide for her children, Rita Domingo experienced back pains. A hospital checkup later showed that the 71-year-old widow’s heart and lungs were filled with water while there were stones in her kidneys.
Doctors diagnosed Domingo, who is also suffering from hypertension, with chronic kidney disease stage 5 or endstage renal disease.
She has since been in the care of her daughter, Ronaly Amador, who took her to Metro Manila to live with her and make treatment easier.
Amador is the sole breadwinner in her family after her husband lost his job in a construction company due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
According to her, the P4,500 she earns every month as a house help is nowhere near the amount needed by her mother for dialysis sessions and medications.
Because of this, Domingo undergoes dialysis only twice a week instead of three times as each session costs P2,500.
Not meeting the required number of sessions weekly has left her suffering from shortness of breath, swelling of the legs, pain and numbness in the back, and difficulty in walking.
Amador said she also found it hard to raise P14,000 a month for her mother’s maintenance medicines consisting of Epoetin (for anemia), Calci Aid (calcium supplement), Losartan and Amlodipine (both for high blood pressure).
Due to the lack of money, Amador can afford to buy only Amlodipine and Calci Aid and in quantities fewer than those prescribed by the doctor.
As a result, Domingo takes Amlodipine only three times a week instead of thrice a day. The same goes for Calci Aid, which she should drink three times a day but takes only thrice a week.
“I want her to have her medications, especially the injection (Epoetin), but I really cannot afford it,” Amador said.
Her mother needs to be injected three times a week to prevent her hemoglobin levels from going down. Each vial of Epoetin costs P1,000.
“I hope someone can help us buy the medications because that is what I cannot provide,” Amador said.
Those who want to help her mother may deposit their donations in Amador’s BPI Account No. 9609-0359-08. She can be reached at 0930-5137426.
WASHINGTON/BEIJING—US President Joe Biden and his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping held their first telephone call as leaders, with Biden saying a free and open Indo-Pacific was a priority and Xi warning confrontation would be a “disaster” for both nations.
Biden also underscored his “fundamental concerns about Beijing’s coercive and unfair practices, its crackdown in Hong Kong, reported human rights abuses in Xinjiang, and increasingly assertive actions in the region, including toward Taiwan,” the White House said in a statement.
Xi told Biden that confrontation would be a “disaster” and the two sides should reestablish the means to avoid misjudgments, according to the Chinese foreign ministry’s account of the call, which took place on Thursday morning in Beijing time but Wednesday evening in the United States.
But the Chinese leader also maintained a hardline tone regarding Hong Kong, Xinjiang and Taiwan, which Xi told Biden were matters of “sovereignty and territorial integrity” that he hopes the United States will approach cautiously.
Cold ties
It was the first call between Xi and a US president since the Chinese leader spoke with former President Donald Trump in March last year. Since then, relations between the two countries have plunged to their worst level in decades, with Trump blaming China for the COVID-19 pandemic.
During the Trump administration, the United States launched a series of actions against China, including a trade war, sanctions against Chinese officials and firms perceived to be security threats and challenging Beijing’s South China Sea territorial claims.
Chinese officials have expressed cautious optimism that bilateral relations will improve under Biden and urged Washington to meet Beijing halfway.
Xi congratulated Biden on his election in a message in November, even though Biden had called him a “thug” during the campaign and vowed to lead an international effort to “pressure, isolate and punish China.”
Continuous pressure
The Biden administration has made it clear that it will continue to maintain pressure on China, however, although it has also pledged to take a more multilateral approach.
The call came after US Secretary of State Antony Blinken spoke by phone to top Chinese diplomat Yang Jiechi on Friday. That was the first announced high-level exchange between top diplomats from the two countries since former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo met Yang in Hawaii last June.
In his call, Blinken said Washington would stand up for human rights in Xinjiang, Tibet and Hong Kong—all issues Yang had days earlier said the United States should stay out of.
Biden has said Beijing is Washington’s “most serious competitor,” and his administration has indicated it will broadly continue the tough approach taken by Trump.