The year started off in the best way possible for 12-year-old Nigel Spiteri, who last weekend made his way back home, into the arrival lounge of the Malta International Airport to find heart-shaped balloons and smiles welcoming him.  

The heart-shaped balloons were significant; symbolizing the child’s new heart, which he successfully found through a donor in the United Kingdom at the end of September, after a five-month wait. After a six-hour-long heart-replacement operation, Nigel woke up with a new heart.

Nigel Spiteri, not a new face to the Maltese public after his video on Xarabank last year, stepped back in Malta sooner than planned, with the recovery from the transplant turning out to be even more successful than predicted.

Malta Community Chest Fund Manager Claire Micallef Pule explained to The Malta Independent that Nigel was born with a heart condition, where the organ aged quicker than usual, however, the family only realized this condition two years ago.

Although, since then, Nigel has been flying up to the United Kingdom often, in the last year he had been there for a ten-month stretch. “Last March he was very tired, and Nigel’s family wanted him to be close by if a heart donor where to be found, as the transplant would need to be done in a matter of hours,” Claire  explained. Nigel had undergone previous heart operations, and heart replacement was seen as a last resort. 

In a press release, the Community Chest Fund Foundation said “the operation went so well that Nigel came back four weeks prior to when he was supposed to.”  President Marie Louise Coleiro Preca also welcomed Nigel at the airport.

The Foundation thanked the Maltese and Gozitans for their generosity in the last L-Istrina event. “With their generosity, the MCCFF can keep helping Nigel and all those who need help from the Foundation,” they said.

€6,048,732 was fundraised by the public in the last L-Istrina event in December, beating its own past fundraising records.