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Mothers protest death of babies in hospital due to power outage

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7 years ago

March 14, 2017

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Activities at the Braithwaite Memorial Specialist Hospital (BMSH), Rivers State apex hospital, were halted when angry nursing mothers went on rampage in protest of perpetual electricity blackout which they said caused the death of two babies in the hospital. The angry mothers made the hospital environment unconducive for medical workers, patients and people coming in to visits their relatives on sick bed.

The nursing mothers were said to have blocked the entrance into the hospital in anger of the death of two babies in the Children’s Ward. They were said to have later proceeded to the Government House, Port Harcourt, to express their anger before the governor.

Joshua Yamunoshi, mother of a three weeks old baby was said to have claimed that her child was in good health when the electricity supply to the hospital was cut off. She had said that the baby was confirmed dead after three hours of power outage in the hospital.

“My child was okay before they took light, but three hours after there was no light, the doctors came and said my baby was dead. The situation at this health facility is disheartening. We, nursing mothers, drink cold water tea and bath with cold water due to lack of electricity to boil water,” She had said:

It was gathered that electricity supply to the hospital has been erratic; nurses had to appeal to patients they cannot attend to them in darkness, so, they needed to show understanding.

A staff member of the hospital was gathered to have acknowledged that the hospital is not connected to the national grid due to a fault at a nearby substation. He revealed that the hospital has two generating sets, saying that one has broken down due to constant use while the only one serving the hospital was switched off at intervals to avoid a possible breakdown.

The staff had further admitted that the two babies died, noting, “Both babies were premature. The first one was born with a very low birth rate, but died due to low temperature. The second baby died due to extreme premature birth.”