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BEFORE: Ms Portia Tapfumanei before a cyst was removed from her tummy.

Paidamoyo Chipunza Health Reporter
The 35-year-old Highfield woman who endured four years with a heavy belly resembling a pregnancy was successfully operated on at Chitungwiza Central Hospital where a cyst weighing about 25 kilogrammes was removed from her tummy.
This was revealed by Chitungwiza Central Hospital chief executive officer Dr Obadiah Moyo yesterday during a fact-finding tour by members of the Parliamentary Portfolio Committee on Health and Child Care.

The woman, Ms Portia Tapfumanei, who was still admitted at Chitungwiza Central Hospital, was recuperating from her wounds at the Intensive Care Unit. “Somehow, she found her way here and we assisted her,” said Dr Moyo. “Doctors removed masses from her belly weighing about 25kgs which were developing from her cervix.”

AFTER: Chitungwiza Central Hospital chief executive officer Dr Obidiah Moyo (left) in the company of legislators from the Parliamentary Portfolio Committee on Health and Child Care yesterday, shares a lighter moment with Ms Tapfumanei after the removal of the 25kg cyst. (Picture by Tawanda Mudimu)

Ms Tapfumanei expressed her appreciation to the doctors who assisted her, saying she felt relieved after the operation.
Although she could not say much as she was still nursing her wounds from the operation, she could be seen waving and smiling at the parliamentarians.

Ms Tapfumanei stopped menstruating in 2010 and her stomach began bulging as if she had fallen pregnant.
After nine months lapsed, her stomach kept on bulging, without the “baby” coming.

Her plight was first highlighted in Kwayedza newspaper where she said at first she would feel movements in her tummy as if there was a baby, but as time went on the movements stopped.