Photo: Ariel Winter/Instagram
Ariel Wintersays her cousin Tino is “doing better” aftersuffering a life-threatening infection.
In a Q&A session on her Instagram Story Tuesday night, Winter, 21, said doctors at Piedmont Hospital in Atlanta, Georgia, are “still trying to figure out exactly what happened, but he’s out of the coma and able to see all of the love and support he has.”
“He has a long road ahead of him,” she added. “He’ll be in the hospital for awhile and then will have to spend time recovering, but he is ALIVE and we couldn’t ask for anything else.”
Ariel Winter/Instagram
TheModern Familyactress revealed on Monday that Tino had been rushed to the hospital and was fighting for his life. He was in the Intensive Care Unit on life support at the time of her post, and while he was making steady progress, Winter explained that his condition would affect him for quite some time.
“The wonderful doctors at the hospital he is currently at have worked tirelessly to find out what is making him sick,” she explained alongside a photo of the pair together.
“They said that if he hadn’t gone on Friday he most likely wouldn’t have made it,” Winter continued. “They have made some progress diagnosing him and he is a little bit better, but will be in the hospital and unable to work for a long time.”
Referring to Tino as “an incredible person who deserves all the love and support in the world,” Winter shared a link to hisGoFundMe campaignwith her followers.
On Twitter Tuesday, Winter clapped back after someone criticized her for asking her followers to consider donating, saying, “you obviously have the money if not all of it some of it to help your cousin.”
“Thanks for your sh— response to my sick cousin,” Winterresponded. “What makes you think I’m not? Love assumptions! BTW — if someone isn’t able to donate, then I absolutely wouldn’t want them to. His friend created the gofundme so I will of course share for my cousin like anyone else would.”
“My family will continue doing everything we can for him (which shouldn’t even be a question) outside of gofundme as well,” she continued. “Criticizing someone when a family member is ill or has suffered a tragedy is horrible. Especially when someone has no idea what’s happening in our real lives.”
She added that she was “shocked” at the onslaught of negativity she received since opening up about Tino’s hospitalization.
“I’m shocked at how many people have sent me hate tweets about my cousin instead of a simple, kind message showing him some love and support,” she wrote. “Nothing else needed to be done aside from that. I re-posted a gofundme that my cousin’s friend made just as anyone else would. Hurtful.”
“Where did you get that info? A reputable source?” Winter wrote. “Must not have been because neither of those things are true facts. I responded the way I did because this is a difficult time for my cousin and our whole family and it just adds more pain when someone is incredibly insensitive.”
On the GoFundMe page, Tino’s loved ones confirmed that he had been diagnosed with Haemophilus Influenzae — a type of bacteria that can lead to various infections — and explained that it “could have led to untreatable and deadly bacterial Meningitis.”
Since the campaign was created on Monday, it has raised over $20,000 of its $25,000 goal.
source: people.com
