Khaing is a 45-year-old woman from Burma who lives with her husband and four youngest children. She also has four older children who live away from home. Khaing and her husband work as day laborers on a rubber plantation.
In March 2016, Khaing started experiencing severe headaches. After a few days, her headache was still very bad and her left eye started to swell. She could not afford to go to the hospital, so she bought analgesics over the counter. The medicines helped reduce her headache, as well as the swelling in her eye.
In September 2016, she started to have frequent headaches again, and over time her eye swelled again. She took the same medicines, but this time they did not help. With time, her eyesight started to deteriorate. She decided to seek treatment in early 2017.
Khaing has a benign tumor behind her eye that needs to be removed to alleviate her symptoms. The procedure will cost $1,500.
“I have many children to feed. I want to get well soon so I can go back to work,” Khaing says.