Parents pay tribute to brave little Luke Ross

Nov 10 2009 by Dan Warburton, The Journal

TRIBUTES were paid last night to a loving boy of five who was killed by a dose of swine flu after overcoming a series of heart problems.

Luke Ross was born with only half a heart and underwent a series of operations to allow him to enjoy a normal life.

But he couldn’t fight off the swine flu virus and died in hospital days after being diagnosed.

Last night his close-knit family paid tribute to their brave son as they prepared for tomorrow’s funeral service.

His mum Cheryl, 39, said: “He arrived into this world in my arms and he left this world in my arms. I lay on the hospital bed and cuddled him as he went. I was distraught, my baby had gone.”

Five-year-old Luke first underwent open-heart surgery at eight weeks. The second was at three months old, a third at one year, another at two years and the last one was when he was three.

Cheryl, of Amherst Road, Fawdon, Newcastle, said: “He had been through so much. He was born with half a heart and had five operations to get the heart to work more efficiently. He had an artificial valve put in and then that closed. Luke was due to go back into hospital this month to get it opened again.”

When Luke, a pupil at North Fawdon Primary School, was in intensive care a friend of a friend, who works for Alan Shearer, told her boss of Luke’s plight.

On hearing his story, he signed a T-shirt and sent it to the Magpie-mad youngster, and it is now one of the family’s treasured memories.

Mum Cheryl with husband John, 39, and daughters Laura, 16, Leah, 11, Georgia, three, and sons Kevin, 17, Jon, nine and James, two, kept a bedside vigil.