Rwandan Boy Comes To U.S. For Cancer Treatment

Thirteen-year old Sibo Tuyishimire likes to play his homemade violin and race his remote control car, like you'd expect from a boy his age.

But unlike other kids, Sibo has a deadly form of cancer called Hodgkin's lymphoma.

Sibo is from Rwanda, but was able to come to the U.S. for a free bone marrow transplant at Children's Hospital here in Boston. And he's expected to return to Rwanda later this year.

Until then, Sibo is recovering with a host-family in Concord, Mass.

Sibo's doctor Dr. Sara Stulac met Sibo during the six years she spent working in Rwanda for the Boston-based nonprofit Partners In Health, the organization that paid for Sibo's trip here and arranged his free medical care.

Stulac told Here & Now's Sacha Pfeiffer that Sibo is just one of many who suffer in Africa from cancer, a problem that's largely not addressed.

"There's a lot of it, it's not being treated, and it can be treated with relatively few resources," she said.

Stulac says that Sibo's case, which required a trip to the U.S., is rare, and that "the vast majority of cancer patients can be treated with relatively few dollars in Rwanda."

Stulac believes that if the continent developed a better infrastructure to deal with cancer, lives and dollars would be saved.

Facts about cancer in Africa: