Keita

Last Saturday  I photographed the new MaliMali collection in Bamako with the help of the lovely Djenneba, seen with Keita above in the garden at the Swedish Embassy residence.

We have yet again spent ten days in the capital as guests of Eva, and once more this has been dramatic and difficult for health reasons. Although he looks happy and smiling in the picture the papers he hold in his hand tell a different story: they are his last  laboratory results.

Keita has not been able to start his new medication although it arrived in Bamako almost two weeks ago. His blood count is too low and he has been given concentrated red blood cells and plasma for over a week but there has been no increase in his blood count and his body seems unable to absorb and benefit from the transfusions. He is getting weaker and weaker. On Sunday he stayed in bed and did not even want to eat. Tomorrow he will once more take a blood test and if it is once more showing no change in his blood count there is only one more possibility left: he will be given something called growth factors , injections of a sort of hormone that stimulates blood production. 

Every time Keita has been hovering between life and death for the last seven years there has always been a solution: a new drug, a stem cell transplant; radio therapy sessions. We have always found a solution.Will we ride out this last crisis too?

I left Keita and Bamako reluctantly this morning for one week in Djenné where I have to work in the studio for a couple of important orders. Keita will now be looked after by his sister in Bamako. The next few days are crucial. 

I don't want to be here but I am grateful there is so much to do.