The senate president, Mr Godswill Akpabio said on Friday that he lost his first grandchild in a government hospital in 2019 due to medical negligence.
He disclosed this during the senate screening of a United States-based nephrologist and founder of Kidney Care Centre, Dr Tunji Alausa.
The ministerial nominee was asked how the nation’s healthcare system could be improved and fake drugs eliminated in pharmaceutical stores.
After the specialist physician had exhausted his explanation, Akpabio announced that he was a victim of medical negligence in a federal medical facility.
He said his first grandchild died in a federal medical centre owing to a haemorrhage caused by medical neglect.
“Every other person has been a victim of medical neglect. My first grandchild in 2019 in a federal medical centre died through bleeding. He was receiving drip and it was tussled in the night — there was no help.
“No doctor, no nurse. He bled until he lost 60 percent of his blood and almost going mental; he struggled and fell on the floor.
“He was looking for water to drink. He rolled on the floor outside and entered the early morning dew,” he said.
Akpabio said his grandchild was later found in the dew the next morning.
“By that time, he had gone into a coma. I was on my way to Port Harcourt for the 2019 rally when they called me,” the senate president added.
Narrating further, Akpabio said when he got to the medical centre he worked with his physician to revive him but to no avail.
“I struggled. They went and brought a defibrillator to attempt to revive the heart, but it did not work,” he said.
The senate president said when he inquired when the defibrillator was last used; he was told the machine had been inoperable for many years.
“I used my hand and struggled with my personal physician; I could not revive him. I had to close his eyes and put him in the mortuary.
“Almost every family has suffered from what is going on in our hospitals. The doctor on duty that night had an emergency in his private clinic and he had to abandon the hospital to rush to go and attend to private patients in his private clinic,” he said.
With TheCable report
