A 10-year-old boy in China with leukaemia spent 150,000 yuan (€20,000) his parents had saved for his medical treatment on online games. 

The child's parents, who are both farmers in Guangzhou, had saved the money after receiving donations from relatives and charity groups, the Beijing Evening News reported. 

His mother first noticed money was missing from her account as she settled a bill at hospital. She filed a police report after discovering that someone had withdrawn 8,000 yuan (€1,000) on six separate instances in January alone. 

Police tracked the withdrawals to a WeChat account named 'King of Glory', the name of a popular online game in China. The account, it turned out, belonged to her own son. 

The child told investigators he had watched his mother use her WeChat account to purchase items, and had learnt to transfer sums from her account to his phone.

He said he did not know that when he pressed 'confirm' to conduct transactions in online games, real money was involved. 

The child's mother blamed herself for the predicament, saying she had not taught her son well enough. "It's all my fault," she told the Beijing Evening News. 

News of the incident spread across China and various individuals and companies, including WeChat owner Tencent, have since offered donations to help make up for the shortfall. 

The mother has since recovered approximately two-thirds of the €20,000 her son spent.