Mano Bottu, the teenage boy from Oplinter who was seen last year in the VRT docuseries ‘Children’s Hospital 24/7’, died on Thursday. The VRT confirms this. An aggressive brain tumor was found in the boy in March 2022.
The heartbreaking story of Mano Bottu (17) could be followed for several weeks since September last year in the VRT docuseries ‘Children’s Hospital 24/7’. The boy was 15 when he ended up in hospital in March 2022 after becoming unwell with friends. A day later, a ‘glioblastoma grade four’ was diagnosed at the children’s hospital of the UZ Leuven, one of the most aggressive brain tumors that exist. Doctors made no bones about it at the time: after such a diagnosis, patients live an average of two years. Barely 5 to 10 percent are still alive after five years.
As tough as it was, Mano himself insisted on talking openly about the disease. “When we cry, Mano says: ‘Do I see a tear there? I don’t want that, mom,’” his mother Elke Vandegaer testified in an interview with this newspaper in October. Dad Ronny Bottu also did not regret agreeing to the recordings. “We get a lot of responses. Even from people we don’t know, which is sometimes strange. But at the same time I think: let’s show people that this exists.”
The main reason why they came out with their story: spreading Mano’s message. A message of perseverance and staying positive. “Of course it is bad,” said dad Bottu in October. “But Mano already said in the hospital: ‘I’m going to try to stay positive and go for it. So that the time that remains for me will be a good time.’”