Microsoft hired doctors to review Aarifa’s condition: Father

Lt Col (retd) Randhawa says US doctor's team contacted CMH doctors and expressed satisfaction with current treatment.

KARACHI: A doctor’s team was hired by Microsoft to consult with doctors of Aarifa Karim – the youngest Microsoft Certified Professional (MSF) – in Pakistan to overview her condition, confirmed Aarifa’s father Lieutenant Colonel (retd) Randhawa.

Randhawa denied media reports of Microsoft owner Bill Gates contacting him personally, although he confirmed that the US doctors have contacted local doctors to speak on the matter.

The team has expressed its satisfaction on the treatment being done at Combined Military Hospital (CMH) in Lahore, he said.

Randhawa added that Aarifa’s condition is “the same” and she is still on the ventilator.

Aarifa, 16, suffered an epileptic attack on December 22 last year which affected her brain and her heart causing her to slip into a coma. She has been on a ventilator since then.

Samples from Aarifa, including scans of her brain were mailed to renowned medical experts in Australia and other countries earlier, while Professor Dr Azhar Hussain, a neurosurgeon at the King Edwards Medical University, Lahore had said that her case was “not hopeless” after reviewing her condition.

Aarifa, born in 1995, was given the title of a Microsoft professional at the age of nine in 2004 and she had visited the company’s headquarters in the US to meet Gates.

Correction: Due to an editing error, an earlier version of the story said Aarifa was given the MCP title in 1995 instead of 2004. The error has been rectified.