THE little girl alleged to have been poisoned with chemotherapy drugs is battling a lung infection and "coded" in hospital last night.
Police have accused the girl’s mother of giving her anti-cancer medication over a 10-month period after purchasing it on the internet.
The four-year-old’s devastated grandmother, in an online post, vowed to "keep up the fight" for the seriously ill girl, who remains in the Brisbane Royal Children’s Hospital.
"Please everyone at the end of the day our beautiful (girl) is still extremely ill,’’ she wrote.
"As my heart is just so broken right now my main concern is (my granddaughter) getting better.
"Every person and prayer helps."
In another post, she wrote about the girl’s attachment to a special chemotherapy doll called Zoe that had been a comfort to her in hospital.
"(She) is very ill at the moment with a lung infection and Zoe has got her through,’’ the grandmother wrote.
"(She) coded this evening and the first words out if her mouth was where is my Zoe. Just adorable.
"So I thank you and the people who sponsored (her) to get Zoe.
"You have made a huge impact in (my granddaughter’s) journey and a very good one."
The grandmother vowed to continue updating a Facebook page set up by the girl’s mother where she had been detailing her battle with illness.
She said she hoped to be able to tell the page’s 7000 followers of the girl’s recovery.
Fight for her little life after chemo poisoning
SHE is four - but already has spent more time in hospital than most adults.
For months, specialists battled to diagnose the mystery illness attacking her cells while the little Gold Coast girl underwent surgery, test after test and prepared for a life-saving bone marrow transplant.
And, all the while, her mother made emotional posts on a social media website about her daughter's plight.
"I feel sick," she wrote on April 1.
"The doctor came in today and told me they are going to start looking for a bone marrow donor and we need to do this ASAP if [name withheld] doesn't start to get better.
"If nothing changes [name withheld] will be dead in six months without a transplant."
But police now believe it was the girl's mother making her sick - feeding her chemotherapy drugs that she purchased over the internet over a 10-month period.
On Wednesday a 22-year-old Gold Coast woman was charged with grievous bodily harm.
Police will allege she fed her daughter the poisonous substance from June 30, 2012 to April 11, 2013.
The young mother shook her head as she was led into a dock of the Brisbane Magistrates Court yesterday.
She did not apply for bail.
Just hours before her arrest, the young mother posted a photograph of her daughter on a Facebook page followed by 7000 people.
The photo showed the girl in a hospital bed, a bandage around her arm and a tube in her nose, with the words: "[Name withheld] is not too well at the moment so will post more pics later."
In March she described the horrors of the oncology ward, saying only someone who had spent the night among sick and dying children could truly understand.
"Seeing the kids in here breaks my heart, some have been in here for months and will be in here for much longer.
"(It is) a world no parent should ever have to see . . . a world where you are woken each night by the screams of children in pain . . . where you can hear children vomiting from the other side of the ward, retching so hard because they have nothing else to throw up." She finishes the post with: "I HATE THIS PLACE. IF I COULD RUN AWAY FROM THIS PLACE I'D RUN A THOUSAND MILES TO BE AWAY FROM IT!"
The woman has set up a donations page on a separate website.
The Facebook page also details the mother's fundraising efforts and provides information for people wanting to donate cash or toys.
The page features dozens of photographs of the sick girl.
The woman wrote that her daughter first began showing symptoms in February last year when bruises appeared on her arms, legs, back and other "uncommon places".
She said she also noticed the girl was bleeding from the gums and had developed a meningitis-like rash.
"The doctors started their standard procedure for unexplained bruising and did a blood test before they questioned me for abuse," the mother wrote.
Doctors initially told the mother the girl could be suffering from an auto-immune disease or leukaemia.
After the girl was cleared for leukaemia, she was sent home in the hope she would recover.
But three weeks later, according to the mother, the bruising returned and the girl started bleeding from the nose and gums.
"Fast forward until this last month and [name withheld] has had a bone marrow biopsy, an upper intestinal bleed, has lost all of her hair, has blood in her urine and has had a nasogastric tube because of rapid weight loss and FAILURE TO THRIVE," the woman wrote last November.
It was not until February this year that doctors diagnosed severe aplastic anaemia.
"She no longer has the ability to make her own blood cells and is now dependant on blood and platelet transfusions," the mother wrote.
Yesterday, the little girl's maternal grandmother told The Courier-Mail she was not allowed to speak about the circumstances surrounding her daughter's court appearance.
"My main concern is my granddaughter at the moment," she said.
Residents at a charity-run crisis accommodation complex on the Gold Coast where the woman lived were shocked to hear she had been charged.
They said the four-year-old girl looked "very sick" when the family arrived about six months ago.
"They're hardly ever here - they're always in Brisbane getting treatment for the little girl," one resident said.
Yesterday's court hearing lasted less than two minutes.
The woman was remanded in custody to appear for a further mention via prison video-link on May 20.
The girl remains in the Brisbane Royal Children's Hospital.
-- Additional reporting by Greg Stolz, David Murray, Thomas Chamberlin
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