GUNSHOTS, HOSPITALS AND THE LAW

It’s been exactly 22years today, Feb 27^th, 3;30am that I heard that ripping gunshot, cruelly shattering the deep silence of the night and stealthily intruding my life. And in the twinkling of an eye, I lost a sister to the cold hand of death. She was shot in the abdomen and lay lifeless on the floor of the room, cold and dead. She was just 10yrs old.

It was not death that took her that night. She died through the hands of the law misinterpreted by medical personnel, and law enforcement officers just like many gunshot victims. It started out as the excuse of incapability to handle gunshot victims in a well-known secondary health facility the family had used for years. First Aid, though as crucial as it would have been to save a life was never administered. We were referred to another hospital where on getting there, a police report was demanded before any treatment could commence. By then, she had lost too much blood, her veins collapsed, her organs failed, as she slipped silently into the world beyond.

By the time a police report was gotten in the wee hours of that dark morning, and the car sped quickly over to a tertiary health center after yet another hospital referred us, she had gone. And though a loved one, she was just one of the numbers in the statistics of those innocent lives lost when police report is demanded before a gunshot victim is attended to in hospitals.

Coincidentally just a day to the anniversary of her demise, a  Bill was proposed on the floor of the House of Representatives by the Chairman, House of representatives on Aviation, Nkiruka Onyejeocha. The bill if passed into law will ensure that medical practitioners attend to gunshot victims first without them having to obtain police report. And this step will go a long way to saving many lives.

According to Onyejeocha, the misinterpretation of the provision of the Robbery and Firearms (SPECIAL PROVISION) Act, Cap 398 is the cause of gunshot victims dying at the steps of hospitals because medical practitioners would not attend to them. The act which stated that any hospital that treats a gunshot victim suspected to be an armed robber is liable to 10,000 fine and being closed down has for a long time been the reason many hospitals turn anybody with bullet in his flesh back or give all manner of excuses in the bid not to attend to them or even give First Aid.

Now, the Bill for an Act to Make Provisions for the Compulsory Treatment and Care for the Victim of Gunshot and Other Matters Connected Therewith is on the floor of the House. And it needs to be passed into law. A law that is guaranteed to save many lives because people have a right to life, it is part of our Fundamental Human Rights. All emergency victims should be treated first while questions are asked later. Saving lives is very paramount. We wait, as this Bill is passed into law.

'Teju Duru is a freelance journalist