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SINGAPORE - $1.2 million.
This is not what someone paid for a home.
Rather it is the medical bill businessman Danny Foo accumulated for the 14 months he was in a vegetative state.
The 48-year-old partner of Quayside Group died last Tuesday.
He had collapsed and fallen into a coma in July last year, two weeks after he first sought treatment for an infected leg at a private hospital.
"Fortunately, Danny had the foresight to buy insurance early. We have only to pay 10 per cent of the bill, but $120,000 is still a pretty huge amount for the family to pay," Mr Foo's elder brother Steven, 49, told The New Paper.
Mr Foo had gone to a private hospital in early July last year to seek medical help for his leg, which was infected and swollen.
He collapsed on July 25, the same day he was scheduled for an operation.
"He had been hospitalised for three days prior after the onset of fever. He collapsed and was on the respirator for the 12 hours before his scheduled operation. The doctors could not figure out what was the cause," his brother said.
"It turned out there was water in his heart and lungs, and he had to undergo an emergency operation," he added.
Two weeks after his collapse and stay at the intensive care unit, the family had him moved to another private facility on Aug 8, where he was to spend the next seven months.
With the mounting medical expenses, the family had Mr Foo discharged in March and cared for at home until he died.
He never regained consciousness and was cremated last Saturday.
Well-liked
Mr Foo's brother Steven said he was well-liked by friends and business partners, and the dozens of wreaths sent to his wake at the Singapore Casket last week could attest to his popularity.
They extended from the fourth floor, where his cortege, was to the ground floor of the building at Lavender Street.
Mr Steven Foo, former general manager of an international hotel in China, said he was "a super nice guy", who was not only concerned for his staff members, but also for his friends' maids and would often buy coffee for them.
"His weekend had been strictly for family. He used to take his sons golfing on Saturday. Now he is no more," he said, adding that his nephews, Joel, 16, and Jarell, 13, had lost a father, a mentor, a teacher and their best friend.
"In the last four years, I lost three family members. I returned to Singapore four years ago to care for my mother, who was dying from cancer. Then, my uncle went. Now my brother. The boys have lost their rock. It had been a very painful period for me," he said.
Other sky-high hospital bills
BILL: $40 million over four years.
WHAT FOR: Breast cancer treatment from 2001 until August 2007.
WHO CHARGED: Dr Susan Lim, a general surgeon in private practice.
WHO WAS CHARGED: Pengiran Anak Hajah Damit, the younger sister of Brunei's queen and a cousin of the sultan.
PAYMENT: Paid by the Brunei High Commission for several years.
BILL: $130,000.
WHAT FOR: Treatment and management of meningitis, which included three operations to relieve the pressure in the skull, a shunt installed to drain excess water from his brain and warded for 50 days, 24 of which were in the intensive care unit.
WHO CHARGED: KK Women's and Children's Hospital.
WHO WAS CHARGED: Parents of three-year-old Ting De Keat.
PAYMENT: Interest-free monthly instalment payments over 42 years.
juditht@sph.com.sg
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