11:50am Friday 30th July 2010
A SEVEN-year-old schoolboy who was knocked down by a reversing van has been blinded in one eye and may have suffered brain damage.
Averam Lever was playing in the street close to his mother’s house when he was struck by a neighbour’s flatback Ford Transit van.
His condition was initially believed to be grave, but after a month in hospital, the youngster is showing signs of progress.
But his devastated mother, Kelly Lever, says her boy is still facing an uphill battle.
“He is doing a lot better but he needs physiotherapy every day to help him sit up and help him with his speech,” said Miss Lever, aged 27.
“The doctors are pretty much convinced he has lost his sight in one eye and he is not talking too much yet.
“He has been in hospital for more than a month now and we are still not sure when he will be coming out. He is making very slow progress.”
It is not yet clear what the full extent of Averam’s injuries will be.
Miss Lever said: “We don’t know the outcome of the brain scans yet or what the full effect will be.”
However, Miss Lever said that, given Averam’s chances of living through his injuries were initially very slim, her little boy had shown incredible strength to start pulling through as well as he has.
She also thanked his school, which sent a DVD with personalised video messages from his friends.
“They just want him to get better and get out of hospital,”
Miss Lever said.
Averam, a pupil at Gaskell Primary School, was playing with a group of friends in Dilham Court, off Chorley Old Road, Bolton, at 4.15pm on Friday, June 25. It is believed that he went into the road to pick up his mobile phone, which was later found crushed, when he was hit by the van.
Following the incident, Miss Lever said the family were praying that he would come through, describing him as a “happy and chirpy kid.”
“I can picture him with his Power Rangers backpack on.
We are all just praying at the moment,” she said.
Miss Lever said she believed it was an accident and that she did not blame the neighbour who was driving the van.
She said: “You can’t stop a child from playing. It could have been any of the kids around here.”
Alison Nightingale, headteacher at Gaskell Primary School in Thomas Holden Street, where Averam is a pupil, described him as a popular young boy and said the youngsters had said prayers and made cards for him.
A Dilham Court resident said the van was a flatback and was carrying slabs of concrete.
A police spokesman said inquiries were ongoing but no arrests had been made.
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