From Chuma Austin, Enugu
There was a melodrama at the Enugu State University of Science and Technology (ESUT) Teaching Hospital/Park Lane General Hospital, Enugu yesterday as patients and their relatives protested against the poor quality food offered to patients as well as the poor sanitation witnessed in the hospital as a result of lack of water.
They also protested against the nonchalant attitude of medical staff to attend to patients especially those in emergencies which has caused many deaths at the hospital.
Parents of a one year and three months old baby girl, Mrs. Leonard Onuchukwu were said to have sparked the protest when they refused to pay the bill given to them, insisting that they would not pay the entire bill because of the meal which neither they nor their child ate because they were not fit even for dogs.
News Echo gathered that relatives of other patients sided the Onuchukwu and said that they too would not pay for the meals which the hospital authorities force on every patient whether eaten or not in conformity with the laid down rule in the hospital.
Addressing newsmen before the man and his wife were whisked away by the police, Onuchukwu who earlier said that over his dead body would he pay for the meal they did not, said that they were admitted in the hospital on Saturday and since then the medical personnel never attended to their child that was stooling and vomiting.
His words: ‘When we were admitted at the hospital on Saturday, neither the doctors nor the nurses were willing to attend to our child that was seriously vomiting and stooling. Nobody cared to look our way but when a family rushed in with their child who was my child’s age with bullet wounds and was turned back because there was no space, it was then I started shouting that they should discharge us so that we look for another hospital. It was then that they started attending to my child and I thank God that she is recovering.
“I am not pleased with all they wrote in the bill which is N29,500 but the one I am insisting that I’ll not pay even if the whole policemen are brought to the hospital, is the food.
“The food they gave us was too poor. The tea looked like goat urine, the rice and other meals they offered were not even fit for some domestic animals and we did not touch them even when they were shouting each time they said that whether the food was eaten or not, it must be paid for.
The Chief Security Officer (CSO) of the hospital, Fidelis Onuduagu, told newsmen, “It is the rule in this hospital that meals offered to patients must be paid for whether taken or not and today must not be an exception. They must pay because this is how others have been paying,” he insisted.
