© DANCEFORYOUS

One Direction in Ghanaian Hospital for Comic Relief

ONE DIRECTION’S Harry Styles stares in wonder at the tiny bundle cradled in his arms.

He whispers: “He’s the smallest baby I have ever seen.”

Just hours old, the baby boy had been taken to one of Ghana’s leading children’s hospitals in the middle of the night.

An infection had left his little body extremely weak but doctors managed to stabilise him, much to the relief of his mum Nusira.

Clearly shaken, Harry says: “My mum worries about me all the time so I can’t imagine how terrible it must be for these mothers to see their babies so poorly.

“Looking into a tiny baby’s eyes and seeing their pain is terrible.”

It’s early Monday morning and the One Direction boys have come to the over-stretched Princess Marie Louise Children’s Hospital in Accra.

Harry, Zayn, Liam, Niall and Louis are on a two-day trip to the Ghanaian capital for Red Nose Day.

 

The film of their African adventure will be shown during Let’s Dance For Comic Relief on BBC1 tonight at 6.50pm.

During their time at the hospital, the boys witnessed the daily reality of babies fighting for their lives against common killers such as diarrhoea and pneumonia — killers that could easily be prevented by vaccines.

Each year, about 1.7million children die from vaccine-preventable diseases around the world. This equates to one child every 20 seconds.

In the emergency unit, bandmate Liam speaks to desperately worried mum Philomina who rushed in her two-month-old daughter Gwendoline at 3am.

Doctors fear she has pneumonia — an illness which strikes down thousands of children in Ghana.

In the bed opposite lies seven-month-old Desirue, who was carried in by her mum Sharon after a severe bout of diarrhoea.

Ashen-faced, Liam shakes his head as he tries to take in the scene, saying: “It must be so difficult seeing your baby so ill.

“At home we take vaccinations for granted. But not all children here have access to them and that can mean the difference between life and death.

“I’ve watched Red Nose Day appeals before and been in tears. But seeing these babies so sick is another level of sadness.

“You just don’t realise how hard life can be in other parts of the world.”

Minutes later, a traumatised young mum bursts through the emergency doors, cradling her unconscious son.

The three-year-old’s limp body is quickly examined by the team who warn that he is “very, very sick with malaria”.

 

Seeing such a critically ill toddler proves too much for Harry.

Through tears he says: “That little boy is too weak to hold his head up, or even cry. It’s so sad.

“He’s lying there seriously sick, when a mosquito net could have protected him.

“Our parents worry about what we’ll be when we grow up but here the parents worry about their babies getting pneumonia and diarrhoea, which can both be prevented with £5 vaccines.”

Upstairs in the acute ward, where Winnie the Pooh murals decorate the walls, Zayn has been chatting to Sara, who brought in her 16-month-old grandson, Paul.

Zayn wells up when she explains that Paul’s mum — her 34-year-old daughter — died of pneumonia three weeks ago.

To make matters worse, the boy’s father has been missing for the past two years, which means Sara has been left to care for her four grandchildren alone.

Her heart-wrenching story hits Zayn so hard that he has to go outside and get some air.

He says: “Looking at that little baby completely helpless with no parents to take care of him, I couldn’t help but think about my little sisters and what would have happened to them if they were in the same position.

“We all waste money but the most important thing we can all do is give £5 to protect children from these illnesses.”

In the same ward, Louis meets Hajia. The shattered grandmother has been sleeping on the floor by her ten-month-old grandson’s bed for the past month.

Like so many here, little Faliratu is an orphan and was admitted with tuberculosis, pneumonia and malnutrition after his mother died four weeks ago.

 

Louis listens in disbelief as Hajia explains that somehow, she will now have to care for eight kids.

He says: “I don’t know how she’s going to manage.”

In the next bed, Niall talks to mum Leticia, a street food seller whose two-year-old daughter Araba is suffering from pneumonia and malnutrition.

He said: “She’s told me she doesn’t earn enough money to take care of her.

“For the past two weeks she has been sitting by her daughter’s bedside worrying, when a simple course of injections could have stopped the suffering.

“Seeing these sick children puts everything into perspective.”

But despite the grim scenes the boys are witnessing, progress is being made.

In 2012, newborn babies started being vaccinated against rotavirus — a stomach bug that can cause diarrhoea, one of the country’s biggest childhood killers.

Comic Relief is also helping to fund GAVI — an alliance that is committed to providing vaccinations to children in poor countries.

Together, they are working to provide the rotavirus vaccine throughout Ghana to help protect babies against this potentially fatal condition.

And thankfully, it’s already making a huge difference with hospitals seeing fewer cases of children suffering from severe dehydration as a result of diarrhoea.

After the hospital, the One Direction boys visit a vaccination clinic in full swing and it’s a joyful and noisy sight.

Louis says: “It’s amazing — these mums are all able to get their babies vaccinated thanks to the generosity of Comic Relief viewers.

“We know the proceeds of our Red Nose Day single will help protect babies but everyone can do their bit, too.

“For less than a fiver, the price of a coffee and piece of cake, you can save a little life — and that’s the best feeling in the world.”

 

All money raised from One Direction’s official Red Nose Day single, One Way Or Another (Teenage Kicks), will help support poor and vulnerable people across the UK and Africa.

The song is available to download from iTunes tomorrow and will be in Sainsbury’s stores across the country from Monday.

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