MAY THE LORD HEAL OUR LAND

I needed to do a medical clearance and it’s mandatory that it must be done in a government General Hospital. I wasn’t prepared for what I saw; the pains of our people not just from their ailments but in efforts to access basic medical care. An old mama’s ordeal was too graphic for my memory; she had lost a firm grip on her limbs, couldn’t sit without support, dimmed eyes and frail frame. She was dragged ON THE FLOOR around the wards by her poor daughters who had lost energy in carrying her because there was no wheelchair to move her about in a whole General Hospital!
It turned out that the inadequacy of equipment was the least of their worries; you cannot encounter MOST of those health workers and not fall sick. The rudeness and crudeness are practically unbearable if you’re not emotionally stable. A laboratory technician walked me out and refused to attend to me because by 12noon on a Friday, I shouldn’t expect her to kill herself with work! The doctor was exceptionally unprofessional in attitude but I met a very rare kind nurse. The public toilet in the General Hospital is an incubator for diseases; the water system is not working, toiletries for where?
With a background in Microbiology before switching gears, I know I can get my blood grouping in minutes but it’s a 24 hour cycle there. The lady who got my blood sample improvised using a disposable hand glove to tie my arm while searching for my calm veins. The X-ray result can only come out the next day, the patients to doctor ratio is a disservice at both ends. In the midst of inefficiency, long queues and slow services, some nurses still had the gut to insult elderly sick people and watch AfMag on their tabs in hope of salary when the month rests.
I promised God, bleeding in my heart and under the biting venom of the institutional disorder to, one day, have a mighty hospital for our poor people. There, good and competent hearts, trained in empathy and emotional intelligence can heal disturbed minds with kind words and deeds. We will then apply medicine for the sicknesses in their cells. So help me God! May the Lord please heal the sick and give strength to the weak.