A Saudi newspaper on Thursday published a picture of a boy which it said was reduced almost to a skeleton. The boy is not from famine-hit Africa but from Saudi Arabia, the world’s oil superpower.

Sabq Arabic language daily did not specify the age of the Salman, who it said has been bed-ridden at a hospital in the southern town of Abha.

Doctors told his aging mother that Salman needs to be transferred to a specialized hospital to diagnose his disease and find a treatment. But his mother is still objecting to his transfer on the grounds she is “much worried about him.”

The boy is the only male in the family after the death of his father. His five sisters have been married and live far away from their village although one of them often comes to help his mother looking after him.

“He is suffering from a rare disease that has caused him general weakness and continuous loss of weight…sometimes his temperature goes up sharply while he gets infections from time to time,” Sabq said, quoting Saeed Al Naqeer, information director at the department of health.

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