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alexk
Guest
Twelve-year-old student Krist Deolal always dreamed of becoming a police officer so that nobody could take advantage of his family. However, he could not fulfil those dreams after he died from a tumour in his lung yesterday.
Deolal, a student of Salazar Trace Government Primary School, succumbed around 2 am in the arms of his cousin Renn Beharry, while his mother Parbatie Deolal and sister Karina Deolal cried uncontrollably. The family had been desperately trying to rush Krist to the San Fernando General Hospital but just as they arrived at the A&E Department he died.
During an interview, his brother Naresh Deolal, 18, said Krist fell ill last week.
“He had a cold and fever. My father thought it was the regular flu so he bought some medication for him. We thought he would get over it but he got worse,” Deolal said.
The family lives in a plyboard home at LP#54, Salazar Trace, a few miles off the South/Central Road in Point Fortin.
Accustomed to dealing with illnesses on their own, Krist’s family never took him to the hospital until he began complaining that he could not breathe.
“It was like a normal cold and fever. We were giving him Panadol. He never complained before about chest problems. He started to get better. He was eating and drinking. I bought juice and we gave him Gatorade. That night he got up and he was saying he could not breathe so I called my nephew Renn to take him to the hospital,” Deolal recalled.
The distraught father, who works at the Point Fortin Borough Corporation, said Krist loved to play sports and was never sickly as a child.
“He used to play cricket and football. He loved fishing. When I go to use the whacker to cut the grass he would come and help me. He used to go and pick pommerac and mandarine to make chow for his sisters,” Deolal said.
He added that even if he had taken his son to the hospital they may not have known immediately that there was a tumour in his lung.
“He would have had to be X-rayed. I did my best to raise him. The doctors did a post-mortem and they said the tumour in his lung was so big that it compressed the right side of his lung, causing it to collapse,” Deolal added.
He said the family was now trying to raise money for Krist’s funeral tomorrow. Anyone wanting to assist the family can contact Deolal at 324-4429.