Abi is an eight-year-old girl from Guatemala. She lives with her older sister and parents in a one-room house made of bamboo and adobe. Her older sister is her best friend, and they are constantly together playing and talking. Her father works in agriculture, which means that her family only have a few dollars per day to live on. This means that her parents would have to choose between paying for her school and clothes and her inhalers.
About two years ago, Abi started to have a severe cough, difficulty breathing, and constantly felt tired. She had to stop playing sports and running around with her friends, since every time she did it she felt like she could not breathe. When she went to the local government-run health outpost, they told her that she had pneumonia, but the treatment they gave her did not help.
Abi’s parents have tried to buy her inhalers to help her breathe since they thought that she might have asthma. The inhalers didn’t seem to help and they were no longer able to afford them, which left Abi with the risk of having life-threatening asthma attacks. Since her condition is dangerous, she was provided with an emergency inhaler to use until she could have a personalized treatment plan, which combines a pill and an inhaler treatment to prevent future asthma attacks.
This treatment will give Abi the chance to have a normal childhood. Inhalers will help her breathe normally, run, play, and walk around her mountainous village without becoming dangerously out of breath. Abi’s mother will also no longer be worried about her daughter having an asthma attack at school, and will relieve some of their financial stress.
Abi’s mother said, “I hope that Abi can play and run and most importantly participate in the activities at school like any other little girl or boy.”