Boy commits suicide to save uremic brother
china.org.cn / chinagate.cn by Chen Boyuan, January 28, 2014 Adjust font size:
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| Before the suicide, Gao Hongtao wrote the letter. He said: "Though I'm gone, my brother has a better chance to live. We are too poor to have both of us the surgery. So please let my brother live!" |
Hopes for life
Gao Hongtao did not intend to give up in the beginning. He had hoped transplants from close family members could save the two brothers.
"Had either I or my wife been able to provide even one matching kidney to either of them, Hongtao would not have ended his life," the father said.
Donations from local charity groups made them capable of paying the transplant surgeries. But the father's blood type was not a match, and the mother's weak health did not allow for such an operation.
Everyone noticed the boy's gloom after the transplant match failed. He was sent into a worse depression after learning even the match was successful. "Lifelong medication" was necessary, according to his brother.
Earlier, the father had taken the two brothers to bigger cities, including Nanjing and Beijing, for treatment. But after spending all the money on the expensive dialysis, the two brothers' health barely improved. The three decided to go back to their home province of Anhui, where the older one stayed in Hefei, while the younger boy insisted on local hospital near home.
Gao Hongtao once offered to abandon treatment, saying "Let our father treat you first; I am giving up," according to his older brother. But Gao Honghui tried to comfort him and said the whole community was concerned about us, "we shall get better together."
As the elder brother recounted, Gao Hongtao smiled the comment off, and fell silent. "How could I have known what he would do?" said his father.
