Health Emergency Initiative (HEI), an NGO, on Wednesday pledged its continued support to Testimony Julius, a five-year-old boy who was involved in a fire incident with his three siblings in their apartment in Ilaje, Ajah area of Lagos.
Health Emergency Initiative, an NGO based in Lagos
Mr Paschal Achunine, Executive Director of HEI, told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Lagos University Teaching Hospital (LUTH), Idi Araba, Lagos, that Testimony was the only child that survived out of four.
Achunine said that Testimony and three of his siblings were involved in a fire incident in their one-room apartment, popularly called face me, I face you, and had various degrees of burns on July 16.
He said that Divine, Joy and Favour, who had 73, 68 and 66 degrees of burn died within 24 hours in LUTH due to the burns.
He noted that Testimony, who had 53 per cent degree of burn survived due to the timely intervention of his NGO.
Achunine said that HEI medical Intervention Project was geared towards providing immediate medical assistance to individuals suffering from very common diseases.
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He said that the focus was to ensure prompt intervention in cases like that of Mr and Mrs John Julius, parents of Testimony.
Gift Julius, the mother of Testimony, told NAN that she left the children in custody of their father when neighbours called her that her house was on fire.
Julius said that when she got home, their father had locked the children in the house to buy something from the bus stop.
She said that when it was getting dark, the children had to light the candle, adding that it was the candle that caused the fire incident that burnt her children.
Gift said that it was lack of fund that made her children die and that the family had no money to cater to them.
She said that it was HEI that came to their rescue by paying the hospital bills and helping to cater for the surviving child.
Achunine said that Testimony would be discharged from the hospital on Wednesday and HEI would continue to cater for them by providing accommodation and see to the schooling of the child.
He said that HEI’s aim was to bring succour to the Julius family and put a smile on their faces again.
Source: NAN
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