THE SYSTEM FAILED HIM: THE ENERGY ANGLE!
by Chidiebele Samuel
It was mostly an uneventful call for the young doctor in the Intensive Care Unit(ICU) until this event occurred. A middle aged man was rushed from the ward as an emergency with difficulty in breathing through his tracheostomy tube in need of urgent suctioning.
Apparently the General Ward has no power supply this fateful night to power the suction machine and only ICU and other designated vital areas were on emergency supply through the specially designated stand by Generator in the hospital. The Manually powered suction machines have all not been functional and haven’t been replaced or repaired.
By the time the patient came through the ICU doors, he has had a cardiac arrest!
For the next 30 minutes frantic efforts were made through resuscitation techniques to revive the patient. Finally the Patient was declared dead and relatives informed.
The Doctor sat down devastated and feeling very sad. Slowly the sadness turned into anger as he begins to ask himself some very deep questions. Who is (are) responsible for this death? Who do you blame for this?
The Power Company that is notoriously unreliable in giving power despite bringing hugely estimated bills for the hospital to pay?
The power regulatory agencies that have abandoned their duties to the citizens of the country (for whatever moral and/or immoral reasons they may have)?
Successive Power Ministry and the federal government who have not been able to achieve sustainable generation of adequate power for the country despite sinking Trillions into it over the years?
The local hospital which was not able to ensure that standby Generator is available in the hospital especially at night in all the wards or to provide alternative options if and when it is not possible to provide stable power to all the wards- in this case ,a manually powered suction machine?
The Plant operator who for whatever reason genuine, immoral, illegal or otherwise did not put on generator to power the wards in the hospital in the night?
All these may have contributed one way or another to the demise of this middle aged man, a father of 3 who the system failed woefully and disgracefully. What should be done to make this not happen again, he wonders? Being in this country, he is almost sure that the change may not be on the horizon even if an audit is done. The findings or report will end up in a file cabinet just like others before it!
However he resolved to start the process, you never know, right? He said to himself.
As he got up from his seat to initiate the paper work, the recently deceased was being wheeled off from the ICU to the morgue. Whatever (if anything) will come out of this, it is definitely too late for him; the young Doctor muttered to himself as he shook his head in despair.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, locales, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental
