Filipino couple seek help for son

A Muslim Filipino couple are appealing for help from Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Abdullah and Crown Prince Salman to help pay a SR 409,000 hospital bill for their sickly baby son, Ershan, at a private hospital.
The couple are in a difficult situation because they cannot take him home until the bill is paid. In the meantime, they have to pay for every additional day he stays in the facility, said Dexter Mateo, the baby boy’s 31-year-old father, who comes from Glan, Sarangani province on Mindanao island.
“We approached the governor's office for help. It eventually called after three weeks to inform us that we should approach the Ministry of Health (MOH).”
The MOH eventually told Mateo and his wife Candy to get a letter from King Abdullah or Prince Salman to help them with the bill.
Doctors at the hospital had found that the baby boy has defective retinas that could lead to blindness if not treated immediately.
They had initially performed an operation but lacked the necessary equipment to completely heal the defect.
“They told us to transfer the boy to King Khaled Eye Specialist Hospital (KKESH) which turned us down because we are not Saudi citizens,” Mateo said.
When Mateo recently went to the Philippine Embassy to register the birth of his son, he was asked to submit a temporary birth certificate from the hospital. However, the hospital would not release the certificate unless the bills are settled.
Mateo said his wife had given birth unexpectedly on March 12, 2013 when she was only six months pregnant. He had rushed her to a hospital close to their home.
They were not expecting to incur such a huge hospital bill because they had planned for her to give birth at a “lower class hospital.” When he tried to transfer her to a government hospital, he was rejected because they are not Saudi citizens.
The private hospital has also not helped them get a transfer and charged them SR 8,000 a day, he said.
His wife was scheduled to go back to the Philippines in December 2012 but decided to stay and give birth in the Kingdom when she found out that she was pregnant.
Mateo said he was prepared to pay a SR 10,000 fine to obtain an exit visa. He works as a sales assistant at a local company. “Our main concern now is the huge hospital bill, which is increasing every day,” he said.