MANILA — Actress-host Kris Aquino has been diagnosed with two more autoimmune diseases since leaving the country to seek treatment for the two that were previously known, according to her sister, Maria Elena “Ballsy” Aquino.

The eldest Aquino sibling spoke about the condition of the youngest in an interview with the non-government organization Banyuhay Aotearoa last Saturday, August 20.

The interview, published on the group’s Facebook page as a live video, touched on Kris’ health, with Ballsy revealing that her sister is now battling at least four autoimmune conditions.

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In Kris’ most recent statement in June, she said she was seeking long-term treatment in the US for Eosinophilic Granulomatosis with Polyangiitis (EGPA).

“When she left, she had two autoimmune diseases. I think now there are four,” Ballsy explained. “She’s not even 90 pounds now, she’s like 85 or 86. For the other treatments that they want to try, she has to put on more weight. She has to get a little bit stronger.”

To explain her condition, Kris earlier shared a detailed medical statement from her attending physician, Dr. Niño Gavino, a Filipino-American doctor based in Houston.

Part of Dr. Gavino’s statement, pertaining to her treatment, read: “The subsequent 9-12 months will be crucial for us to see if she (Aquino) can achieve remission and continue the regimen further because to survive, Ms. Aquino will have to make whichever combination works, her lifetime maintenance medicine.

“With no medical intervention overall, the life expectancy of those with EGPA is at about 25%. With the proper treatment, 5-year survival rate is at 62%. Only 1 in every 1 million people get this form of vasculitis per year. That is how rare and hard to treat Ms. Aquino’s case is.”

In Ballsy’s interview — more than two months later — she said Kris and her medical team are “still trying to give her the right, correct treatment.”

“She has so many allergies that all the medicines they’ve been trying haven’t been working, or maybe they did but then the side effects—they were not too happy about,” Ballsy shared.

Ballsy credited Kris’ sons Josh and Bimby for “keeping her fighting spirit even stronger,” despite the challenges in her treatments.

“There was a time [when] she was really feeling that she was about to give up because she was having such a difficult time,” Ballsy recalled. “But then, when she looks at the pictures of her sons or when she sees them, then she knows she still has to fight.”

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