The Edo State chapter of the Nigerian Medical Association has raised the alarm over what it described as the sorry state of health facilities in the state, claiming that doctors in hospital in the state have resorted to the use of candles in performing their duties, owing to the incessant non-availability of electricity.
The NMA has, therefore, urged the state government to renovate health care facilities in the state to stop avoidable deaths in its hospitals.
The state NMA Chairman, Dr. Emmanuel Osaigbovo, who raised the alarm while speaking with our correspondent in Benin City, also called on the state government to declare a state of emergency in the health sector.
Today, there is hardly any functional ward that is befitting for the people
He said, “Today, there is hardly any functional ward that is befitting for the people to recover from their infirmities. The wards are dilapidated and ironically pose a major health risk to those who are being cared for and those who render services therein.
“In some of these obsolete facilities, doctors, in their usual zeal to work, resort to the use of candles and personal rechargeable lanterns when the authorities fail to provide basic electricity. The buildings are falling apart in their numbers due to lack of maintenance.
“We seriously hope that there is no collapse of one of those buildings on people who have come to the hospital to get better or on those who have come there to make people feel better. There is no greater catastrophe than that.”
Osaigbovo further said, “The theatres and laboratories are at best skeletal in the services they render due to lack of basic equipment and consumables. Patients have to seek help in peripheral facilities and most times fall into the hands of quacks.”
Meanwhile, facilities at the Edo State-owned Central Hospital in Benin have become dilapidated as the state government has allegedly failed to provide adequate funding for its operations.
Our correspondent gathered that the alleged high rate of deaths in the hospital could be attributed to the alleged insensitivity of the state to the shortage of medical personnel in the hospital.
A top management staff of the hospital, who pleaded anonymity, said that inspite of the several complaints made to the state government about the problems at the facility, nothing had been done to remedy the situation.
He also said that when the members Edo State House of Assembly Committee on Health visited the hospital some time ago, the complaints about the shortage of medical staff and dilapidated structure confronting the facility were also brought to their notice.
But he lamented that up till now, the state government had yet to act on the complaints, stressing, “The so-called five star hospital built by former governor Adams Oshiomhole is now lying fallow without any equipment.”
Some pregnant women in the state had during the tenure of the immediate past governor Adams Oshiomhole protested in Benin against the lack of facilities in the two state-owned hospitals-Stella Obasanjo Hospital and Central Hospital.
