Kirby, parents pay COMTEQ a visit

After a successful P3million liver transplant operation

Accompanied by his parents, Kirby Hizon, the one-year old baby who was found last year to be suffering from biliary atresia, visited COMTEQ Computer College after undergoing a successful P3-million liver transplant operation in Taiwan late last year.

Kirby’s liver transplant operation was made possible through a community-wide fund raising campaign initiated by the local chapter of the National Union of Journalists of the Philippines in October 2003.

COMTEQ students, led by the student council headed by Allan Dale Calisaan, immediately supported the campaign’s Alyansa ni Kirby program by soliciting funds from the Freeport gates, and by actively participating in the benefit concert dubbed Youth Rock for Kirby.  Child star Dindin Llarena and the city’s local bands offered their services in the concert for free.

Both activities were spearheaded by the local chapter of the NUJP and the Subic Bay Metropolitan Authority which was headed by then chairman and administrator, Felicito C. Payumo.  Proceeds from the fund raising activities were kept in a bank account being supervised by the LIFT Babies Foundation, a foundation established to help biliary atresia patients.

The campaign was later supported by schools, duty free shops, supermarkets, banks and Mercury Drug outlets.

During the concert, numerous COMTEQ students donated their time and effort in manning computer equipment, creating the computer graphics presentation, collecting donations and acting as ushers.  A band composed of COMTEQ students and instructors even took part in the concert.

When donations for Kirby seemed slow, Mr. Saturnino Dumlao and Mr. Florentino Paller, both NSTP instructors pitched in.  They coordinated the coin collection activities of their students at the Rizal and Magsaysay gates of the SBMA, and included collection activities as part of the NSTP course.

Student trainees at the COMTEQ I.T. Center, on the other hand, created a website for Save Baby Kirby Campaign that made contributions even from abroad possible.  The website also kept all donors and contributors to the project updated on the developments of the campaign.

ABS-CBN later supported the campaign and generated much of the needed funds for the operation through its television programs, Maala-ala Mo Kaya and TV Patrol .  The Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office also pitched in a P1-million donation to the project.

Kirby was born with a rare liver disease called biliary atresia which could have caused his death within two years of birth had he not undergone the liver transplant operation.  Biliary atresia is a condition wherein the bile ducts are absent or unable to convey bile out of the liver, causing the liver to fail and the baby to die within two years after birth.

Kirby was operated on in Taiwan in August last year with his father, Erickson Ongkiko as the liver donor.

Kirby’s parents, who accompanied Kirby to COMTEQ thanked the students for their valuable contribution to the whole project which gave their first born child another lease in life.

Child star Dindin Llarena sings for ailing Kirby

OLONGAPO CITY – Child star Dindin Llarena took the cudgels for an ailing one-year old biliary atresia patient and agreed to perform for free in a benefit concert scheduled on February 7 at the Football Field inside the Subic Bay Freeport Zone.

The benefit concert, which is being co sponsored by the Olongapo and Zambales Association of Private Technical Institutions and the local chapter of Union of Journalists of the Philippines, is one of the series of activities aimed at generating three million pesos for the much needed liver transplant operation for Kirby Erick Hizon.

Llarena, who hails from Olongapo City, was represented by her aunt, Solidad Nasaire, during the negotiations with Kirby’s parents.  Nasaire assured Kirby’s parents of Dindin’s help in the fund drive.  Nasaire was almost in tears when she saw Baby Kirby and immediately donated five thousand pesos for the fund raising project.

Llarena’s relatives also refused an offer of free hotel accommodations during their stay in Olongapo and suggested that the cost of the hotel be donated to Kirby instead.

Kirby, who was born in Castillejos, Zambales, has been the subject of a community wide fund raising campaign being organized by the local chapter of the NUJP which started three months ago.

Kirby is suffering from biliary atresia, a rare liver ailment which leads to sure death, normally within the first one to two years of the baby’s birth, unless the patient undergoes liver transplant operation.

The NUJP took on the cause of helping Kirby after learning that his parents, a young couple from a poor family in Zambales, often cannot afford to pay for daily medications and special formula milk to keep their baby alive.

OZAPTI President Dean Myrna Matira also learned of Kirby’s situation and decided to help in the campaign and said, “helping Kirby is much lighter than the trouble of having to address the problem if we were the parents of the afflicted child.”

Aside from Llarena, the concert will feature local bands, Xtrm, D’zyre, Infinite, Foulvemder, Templar, Deadspot and the Subic Performing Artists, all of which agreed to perform for free.

Aside from the concert, the NUJP has placed bamboo coin banks in several establishments in Olongapo and the Subic Bay Freeport to receive donations for Kirby.  The project, dubbed Alkansya ni Kirby, is being supported enthusiastically by duty free shops, supermarkets, schools, banks, internet cafes, and mercury drug outlets.

Students from concert major sponsor, COMTEQ Computer College, have for almost a month now, collecting donations from passengers and pedestrians at the main gate of the Subic Freeport, and selling tickets at the gates of various Subic Freeport locators.

A local cable provider, STV 6, meanwhile has sponsored a telethon and generated a substantial amount for the fund.

Donations also come from anonymous donors in Manila and from a few Senators.

Donors can get in touch with the Help Save Baby Kirby Secretariat office at Telefax: 047-252-3335, or write by electronic mail at savekirby@comteq.edu.ph.

COMTEQ Students Take up the Cudgels for Baby Kirby

At the beginning there were just rumors.  A child had been afflicted with a deadly disease that was slowly but surely killing him.  His only hope lay in a very expensive liver transplant, far beyond the means of his parents.  People and organizations were working to help raise the needed funds.

Then the LIFT BABIES Foundation, the primary support group for victims of biliary atresia sought the help of the National Union of Journalists of the Philippines local chapter (NUJP-OS).  Since the COMTEQ Deputy Administrator is a member of the NUJP-OS, COMTEQ became a beehive of activity in the rush to raise the funds necessary to save the baby’s life.

Curious questions from the COMTEQ students soon ferreted out the details and gave the baby a name:  Erick Kirby Hizon, now 14 months old, the only child of a couple whose sole breadwinner is factory worker at the SBMA.  The baby is afflicted with biliary atresia, a disease marked by the absence of bile ducts that cause bile to accumulate in the liver, eventually killing it and the baby.  The only hope at this late stage is for a liver transplant within a year, that would cost P3 million.  The task of raising the required amount in time to save the baby’s life was daunting.

Soon the curiosity felt by the COMTEQ students, was replaced by pity at the prospect of an innocent life in peril.  Reinforced by their lectures on Values, and firm in their belief in a pro-active way of life, COMTEQ students can not sit idly by while death threatens a child.  Especially not when they learned further, that even impoverished Aeta communities have pitched in to help.  It was time for action; time to be pro-active.

COMTEQ students began to volunteer to lug bamboo coin banks to gather donations from passersby.  When the trickle of volunteers became a drove, the students requested to be allowed to apply their work towards the completion of their NSTP subject, to enable them to devote more time to fund raising.  Permits were obtained, the students were organized into groups and schedules were given.  The bamboo coin banks were being filled more rapidly now.

When the “Save Baby Kirby” campaign got underway, a Save Kirby website, (Powered by COMTEQ Students) was their contribution.  For the COMTEQ students, it was just another way of putting their skills to work.

Soon the fund raising activity spilled over to the Night Market at the SBMA.  Again COMTEQ students were at the forefront of the coin bank campaign, many of them working till way past midnight.  How can they do any less, when even street children begging for alms at the night market drop coins at their bamboo coin banks?  The experience heightened their social awareness even more.

Now, another fund raising activity is planned.  A concert entitled “Youth rock for Kirby” will be held on February 7th, 2004.  Already COMTEQ students are busy folding and preparing appeal flyers.  It would not surprise me to see COMTEQ student volunteers, again in droves, come concert time.  After all, they are pro-active.