Two-month-old Arseni has a rare immune deficiency and urgently needed surgery that couldn’t be done in Estonia. The Health Insurance Fund agreed to pay for treatment costs in the United Kingdom, but the expensive special medical transport required it wouldn’t cover, the fund initially said.

The Tartu University Clinic’s children’s fund was able to collect more than €150,000, which was more than enough to get Arseni to the UK and back.

Altogether €30,400 were needed for transport and accommodation, following a prognosis that they would need to stay there for six months, the children’s fund said, whose board decided to fly the boy there on the fund’s reserve money, and then start collecting donations to make up for it.

The Health Insurance Fund now announced that given the special circumstances and taking into account the fact that the boy couldn’t possibly have received sufficient help here in Estonia, it would make an exception and cover the travel costs as well.

Küllike Saar of the Tartu University Clinic’s children’s fun said that they managed to collect almost five times more money than initially required would help the boy and his family as well if they should require more help in the future, the fund stated on Wednesday.

Given the situation that the Health Insurance Fund would now pay for the travel costs, the money gathered would be used to help Arseni and his family, but once their costs were covered, it would then be going towards helping others as well, the fond’s Küllike Saar said.