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ShareLondon: Despite being given just a few weeks to live by doctors, a little boy with a serious heart condition has managed to survive, courtesy anti-impotence drug Viagra.
Little Alfie Oliver, who needs six doses of the drug every day, is set to celebrate his first birthday in two weeks. Alfie was born with two of his main arteries reversed, and surgeons switched them when he was 16 days old.
During a second operation at three months, he had a heart attack and was rushed to intensive care. Parents Tracey, 26, and rail worker Rob, 28, were told that he was less likely to survive and were put in touch with a children's hospice.
Medics diagnosed the incurable blood vessel disorder pulmonary hypertension, which hits only a handful of children in Britain each year.
They prescribed liquid Viagra to open up the vessels. After the treatment, Alfie is doing well and learning to walk, although doctors have warned that he may one day require a heart and lung transplant.
"We call it Alfie's lifesaver. It makes people giggle when we tell them - but if it keeps our son alive then who cares," Tracey told the Sun.
