Joshua doing well but campaign hit a snag
Funds needed to get Joshua's message out there, production company says.
Joshua Coetzee, 11, is doing better and better this year to date, but a campaign to share his journey with others has hit a slight snag.
Joshua is being treated for Ewing sarcoma, a rare bone cancer disease in which cancer cells are found in the bone or in soft tissue, in his case near his lower spine. He was diagnosed in July last year and has since undertaken a series of six chemotherapy treatments at the Wits Donald Gordon Medical centre, of which the last session was in December.
In January, Joshua started undergoing radiation therapy, of which the last session is on 29 February.
According to his mother Francesca in a post to his Facebook page, Joshua’s Journey, his treatment is long not done.
“After radiation, his treatment is still not complete,” she wrote.
He is to undergo eight months of chemotherapy afterwards, which will be less intrusive than his chemotherapy last year, with a session scheduled every three weeks.
“There is still a way to go with his journey,” Francesca wrote, and thanked all the parents, siblings, family and friends and guys from Mengelmoes Media for their love, support and prayers.
Hendré van der Berg and Ryno Smook of Mengelmoes Media were inspired by Joshua’s journey to date and in December decided to produce a documentary to give residents a closer interaction with children living through cancer and various treatments. For this, they created an Indiegogo crowd-funding campaign which brought in around R7 500 towards its production by the time the campaign closed, which is a mere 10 per cent of what they need.
“It’s safe to say we hit a snag or two while walking this journey with him,” Van der Berg told the Record.
“Despite the fact that we aren’t quite where we want to be with fundraising, we will not be giving up hope, just adjusting our plans and perhaps altering the way in which we produce this film.
“There are so many people and corporate entities that have contacted us after the Indiegogo campaign closed and would like to get involved — it goes without saying that we’d appreciate those people coming on board.”
Van der Berg invites residents who still want to help them share Joshua’s journey to contact him on 082 789 9355.
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