When Catherine was three months old, her mother noticed she was fighting for breath. She sweated and gasped while feeding, struggled while she slept, and breathed too fast for a baby her age.
The people around them had their own explanations. Some said it was the family planning pills. Some said witchcraft. Some said the family had failed to observe the customs. In their community in Musoma, in Tanzania’s Mara Region, congenital heart disease was not something people had heard of.
Catherine’s mother listened to the doctors instead.
The regional hospital referred them to Bugando in Mwanza, where doctors found the cause. Catherine had a ventricular septal defect, a hole in the wall between the two lower chambers of her heart. It is one of the most common heart defects children are born with. The medications didn’t fix it. A hole in the heart needs surgery, and that surgery was not available where they lived.
Then a children’s heart screening and surgery camp opened in Dodoma, run by The One New Heart Tanzania together with Benjamin Mkapa Hospital. It was about 900 kilometres away. The family had little money and every reason to stay home. Her mother took her anyway.
On 28 May 2026, at one year and two months old, Catherine had her heart repaired.
Her mother’s message to other parents is simple. If your child breathes too fast, tires easily, or isn’t gaining weight, don’t wait and don’t listen to the fear around you. Take them to be checked. The earlier it’s found, the more can be done.
Catherine’s defect is one that thousands of children in Tanzania are born with. Most are never diagnosed. Her mother made sure she was one of the ones who was.
