TIYANE – A four-year-old boy, from a seriously disadvantaged family at Tiyane Village, Muxhe Nkuna find it difficult to play with other kids as he is suffering from an Umbilical Hernia, that started when he was two months old.

His mother, Mrs Noria Nkuna (23) elaborated that since the condition started to develop, she never took the young Muxhe to the Clinic or Hospital until members of the Africa Cry Aids Pandemic Organisation discovered the boy a fortnight ago. Mr Jeremiah Mathelemusa co-ordinator of the organisation said that, after discovering the child, he advised the boy's mother to consult the doctors at Elim Hospital.

The doctors advised Noria to take her son to the Ga-Rankuwa Hospital for an operation and it was decided that Muxhe would be operated on April 9 this year. However, the big problem remains, who will provide money for food and the travelling costs, as Noria is unemployed and coming from the extremely disadvantaged family.

In addition, the young Muxhe is not getting a child support grant, as his mother doesn't possess an identity book. Noria told Mirror that the father of her four years old boy doesn't care about the future of his son.

Noria is staying with seven of her brothers and sisters and her mother in a one-roomed shelter at Tiyani.

According to Noria's mother, Mrs Shalati Nelly Baloyi, she is unable to support her children, as she is unemployed and not yet qualified for the pension fund. When Mirror visited the family on Monday, there was nothing to eat and the children were not at school. When asked why they are not at school they said that they cannot go to school with empty stomachs and teachers always chase them back, as they don't have school uniforms.

According to Dr A Ngwili Funyufunyu from the Songozwi Medical Centre in Louis Trichardt, the young boy is suffering from an Umbilical Hernia. He said that if the abdominal wall is weak at the side of the navel, so the pressure inside the abdomen forces the contents in this case and the intestines to go through the point of weakness and sometimes it can cause serious implications.

Doctor Funyufunyu indicated that Muxhe's situation is not complicated that a simple operation can be done in any hospital. "Health practitioners in villages must put Vhathu Phanda in practice, stating that if health authorities in the village were visiting the family, Muxhe should have been helped long ago" he said.