Vanya Arbuzov lives in the town of Chusovoy in the Perm region. The boy has acute myeloblastic leukemia. In the summer he underwent a bone marrow transplant; his mother became a donor. The bone marrow was engrafted, but one of the most common and dangerous complications after the transplant occurred – graft-versus-host disease. This means that healthy and active cells of the donor’s bone marrow consider the “host” cells of Vanya’s body to be foreign, attack them and try to destroy them. The boy can be saved thanks to the drug Jakavi, but his mother does not have the money to buy it.
Every minute an invisible but very difficult battle is going on in Vanya’s body. Every morning in the hospital he stubbornly gets up, despite his weakness, does exercises on the mat, eats tasteless diet porridge and sits down to study. And a war is raging in his body. Then Vanya eats a tasteless diet lunch and, if he’s lucky, goes for a walk with his mother. And in his body the cells stubbornly destroy each other. Outwardly it is almost imperceptible. The only sign that the battle is going on is a pink, itchy rash on the skin. Doctors treat her with hormonal drugs, but they don’t help. And Vanya gained a lot of weight because of hormones. He is very ashamed of being overweight and having a rash, so he is even glad that the doctors do not allow him to walk where there are a lot of people. It is better to walk alone.
Before, Vanya didn’t know what loneliness was. Handsome guy, footballer, biker, lots of friends, first love.
“I didn’t like reading before, but when I was lying in a sterile box after a transplant, I read Robinson Crusoe. I really liked it! Of course, 30 days in boxing is not like almost 30 years on the island, but probably similar feelings,” says Vanya.
I also read George Clayson’s book, The Richest Man in Babylon. And I was so impressed that I remotely entered the Faculty of Entrepreneurship and Social Management in Yekaterinburg straight from the hospital.
This book says that you only need to recognize the enemy that lives inside you once and you will be able to fight it. Vanya thinks that it is him, quite the opposite. He has everyone inside him, but the new cells cannot recognize them, so they fight all the time and do not understand that they are killing Vanya. But the boy does not want to think about bad things.
“I have plans,” Vanya smiles. “But I can’t talk for now?” Life is such an unpredictable thing, it turns out.
“Everything happened as fast as in a bad dream,” says Svetlana, Vanina’s mother. “In January, there was a medical examination at the military registration and enlistment office and tumor cells were found in my son’s blood. He was urgently sent for examination to the Perm Regional Children’s Hospital and was diagnosed with acute myeloblastic leukemia. In the spring, Vanya underwent three cycles of high-dose chemotherapy, and in the summer he underwent a bone marrow transplant at the Regional Children’s Clinical Hospital (RCCH) in Yekaterinburg.
Before Vanya and his mother had time to rejoice at their success, the transplant rebelled against its owner. But the most important thing is that there can be no winner in this war. The only way out is to introduce and reconcile the cells with each other. Otherwise, Vanya’s condition will worsen and his liver, lungs and mucous membranes will begin to deteriorate. To save Vanya, the drug Jakavi is needed. It will help the donor’s bone marrow cells finally understand that there is no need to fight anymore – we are all our own here!
But the Collective Clinical Hospital in Yekaterinburg does not have this medicine, and the child’s mother cannot buy it on her own: it costs almost a million rubles!
A little shy, Vanya still talked about his plans. He wants to become an entrepreneur, preferably a millionaire.
– Why? – I explain.
“Being independent, helping my mother, helping everyone,” Vanya answers.
The boy is not giving up on new plans. And already in the hospital, in parallel with his studies, he is looking for a remote job. But Vanya still hasn’t managed to earn a million to save himself. Help is needed right now. Let’s save Vanya, and he will recover, learn, earn his million and definitely help someone too. After all, he knows how important it is for help to arrive in time.
To save Vanya Arbuzov, 953,415 rubles are missing.
Transplantologist at Larisa Vakhonina Regional Children’s Clinical Hospital (Yekaterinburg): “Vanya was diagnosed with acute myeloblastic leukemia, a disease that belongs to the group of high-risk of relapse. Given the diagnosis and the severe course of the disease, the child required a bone marrow transplant. His mother became a donor. After the operation, Vanya experienced a common and dangerous complication – a graft-versus-host reaction with skin lesions. For health reasons, the child needs immunosuppressive therapy with the drug Jakavi, which is not available in our hospital.”
The cost of the drug is 985,415 rubles. Perm State Television and Radio Broadcasting Company viewers will collect 32,000 rubles. 953,415 rubles are missing.
Dear friends! If you decide to save Vanya Arbuzov, do not let the cost of salvation bother you. Any donation from you will be gratefully accepted. Money can be transferred to Rusfond or to the bank account of Vanya’s mother, Svetlana Nikolaevna Antonova. All necessary details are available on Rusfond. You can also use our electronic payment system by making a donation by bank card, mobile phone or electronic cash, even from abroad (details at rusfond.ru).
About Rusfond
Rusfond (Russian Aid Fund) was established in the fall of 1996 to help the authors of desperate letters to Kommersant. After reviewing the letters, we publish them in Kommersant, on the websites rusfond.ru, kommersant.ru, on the Rossiya 1 TV channel and on Radio Vera, in social networks, as well as in 133 print, TV and online media. Transfers from bank cards, electronic cash and SMS messages are possible, including from abroad (more details on rusfond.ru). We are simply helping to help you. In total, more than 21.376 billion rubles were collected. In 2024 (as of September 19), 1,259,057,755 rubles were collected and 1,257 children received assistance. Rusfond is a laureate of the Silver Archer national award of 2000 and, since September 2017, has been included in the register of SO NPOs, which provide socially useful services. In June 2024, Rusfond received a grant from the President of the Russian Federation to include 6,000 new volunteers in the National RDKM. At the same time, the National RDKM received a presidential grant to organize assistance to Russians in finding donors in the Russian Federation and abroad. President of Rusfond Lev Ambinder is a laureate of the State Prize of the Russian Federation.
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