Sunday Star Times
Four-year-old Lucy Laws' condition has worsened. The daughter of Wanganui mayor Michael Laws has now been in isolation in Wanganui Hospital for more than two weeks, battling a virus.
Lucy, who was diagnosed with leukaemia a year ago, has no immunity and specialists have recommended she be transferred to Auckland's Starship hospital. However, Laws said he had been told Starship was so full that Lucy would be placed in a general ward in Auckland City Hospital, where she would be no better off than in Wanganui.
Lucy is running fevers every six hours. Her father said yesterday she had undergone platelet transfusions and faces further transfusions if her condition does not improve. Her chemotherapy, which involved three doses daily, has stopped to let her rebuild some immunity.
Her mother, Laws' partner Leonie Brookhammer, and six- month-old brother Theo are in her hospital room with her, but other family members can only view her only through a window.
On Friday Lucy's parents were told by a specialist paediatrician that her immunity had declined further and it was now urgent she be transferred to Starship where she can undergo more tests and stay in a pressurised isolation room.
However, none was available.
Laws said Starship specialists were talking to Lucy's doctors two or three times a day, which gave them a "certain confidence".
"The irony is that 20 years ago she would have died, but these days she, and children like her, have a shot at survival that is being compromised by a lack of facilities and shortage of beds, because there is no nationwide structure on the need for isolation rooms for kids."
Laws is on leave from the mayoralty, but said he planned to return to work tomorrow.
"It is very difficult, but like all families who have kids with cancer, you find ways of coping."
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