Betty Moleya
Pretoria – After undergoing a risky bone marrow transplant at only 3 months old in 2015, Yusuf Saloojee remains the first child in South Africa to be tested at birth for Severe Combined Immunodeficiency Syndrome.
He was also the youngest child the South African Bone Marrow Registry had ever facilitated.
The rare X-linked chromosome disorder is considered to be deadly.
Bone marrow is where blood cells are produced. Blood cells are critical to a person’s immune system; they carry oxygen, fight infection and prevent bleeding.
A transplant replaces the patient’s diseased bone marrow with healthy bone marrow stem cells, so that the patient can start producing healthy blood.
Yusuf is now 7 years old, but his brother, born a few years before him and diagnosed with the same condition, was not so lucky; he had no donor and died at only 11 months old, in 2008.
Parents Sadiyya and Muhammed Saloojee said they were prepared for the worst when they found out they were pregnant with Yusuf.
“After losing our first son, we did not want to go down the road of false hope. So when Yusuf was admitted the second time to the ICU, I said to the doctors ‘please, if there is no hope, do not put him through this. We can accept this’.
“But the doctors gave us hope. They said that we could get through this,” said Sadiyya.
Yusuf started Grade 1 this year, and is described as healthy, full of energy, and very affectionate, “with a contagious smile that lights up anyone’s day”.
The Saloojee family, from Rustenburg, spent most of their time in Pretoria in preparation for Yusuf’s bone marrow transplant and medical health care.
Yusuf’s donor was a 9-year-old girl from the UK, whose parents had stored her umbilical cord stem cells at birth in case of an illness when she grew up.
Although the bone marrow transplant was successful, Yusuf went through many hardships after the procedure, but against all odds he made it through.
Even with more than 39 million donors registered around the world, many patients in desperate need do not find their donors in time and do not survive.
“Family members, brothers and sisters, are generally most suitable. However, due to the average family size, only about 30% of patients have a compatible sibling,” said the South African Bone Marrow Registry. People are encouraged to be bone marrow donors and anyone between the ages of 16 and 45 can register to donate.
Pretoria News