Former Tongan rugby international supports call for a dialysis clinic Featured
Sione Vaiomo'unga carries the ball for Tonga during pool game with Canada in the 2011 Rugby World Cup in New Zealand
17 February, 2017. A former Tongan international rugby player, who says he is stranded overseas because of kidney disease, has added his voice to calls for dialysis treatment to be provided.
Sione Vaiomo'unga, 27, played for Tonga at the 2011 Rugby World Cup before securing a contract to play in Romania.
But in 2014, he was diagnosed with kidney disease, and has remained in the eastern European country for dialysis treatment because it is not available in Tonga.
Mr Vaiomo'unga said he is uncertain how he would have fared had he been diagnosed in Tonga, where hundreds of people are said to be in need of dialysis, according to the Tonga Dialysis Foundation.
The foundation said this week that it had been waiting for more than a year for the government to write a letter of support so private donors could fund a clinic.
Instead, the government said it was focussing on the prevention and management of diabetes rather than dialysis.
But Mr Vaiomo'unga, who was hoping for a kidney transplant so he could return to Tonga and see his parents for the first time in three years, said the government needed to look after its people.
-RNZI
