Turning old before their time
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E-mail China Daily, April 25, 2012
Sang Zixuan is seven years old and his brother Sang Ziheng is six - yet they look like old men.
The children suffer a rare early-aging condition, or progeria, that none of the doctors who visited their family at a village of Luyi county in Henan province could diagnose or treat, said their grandfather Sang Fayu.
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Sang Zixuan and Sang Ziheng, seven and six years old, suffer from progeria, a rare early-aging condition, at a village of Luyi county in Henan province. |
Both looked like normal children in their first year. Sang Zixuan was plump and healthy when he was born, and Sang Ziheng could speak a few simple words by the time he was 1 year old.
But in their second year, things changed. The boys developed skin conditions, their bones became fragile and they lost the ability to speak.
The family took the children to many medical agencies nationwide, including some of the most advanced hospitals in Henan and Northeast China's Heilongjiang province, but none could treat the rare disease.
"The doctors just gave my grandchildren some physical checks, and they could not prescribe any medicine for the symptoms," Sang told China Daily. The children's parents have spent almost 600,000 yuan ($95,000), mostly borrowed from relatives after their savings ran out, seeking medical treatment.
Their parents started working recently on a construction site in Tianjin in order to afford the medical expenses, while the boys live with their grandparents.
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