Blackouts in hospitals

By Daily Revelation Editor

Zesco Board chairman Vickson Ncube says the company policy is there not to loadshed hospitals but he can’t guarantee that they won’t be loadshedded.

Ncube’s comment follows a recent incident where a Lundazi Council police officer and his wife agonizingly watched their daughter struggle to her death after the genset at Lundazi General Hospital ran out of diesel.

Narrating the incident to Daily Revelation last Thursday, council employee Stephen Nkole Zulu said he and his wife watched their child “deteriorating” after the oxygen machine that had been administered to aid with her breathing failed, following electricity failure after the genset the hospital uses during the daily load shedding ran out of diesel.

Zulu said his daughter had earlier on Monday been diagnosed with pneumonia and was aided by the oxygen machine throughout her hospitalization.

Contacted to comment on the sad incident, Ncube said what the country was going through was not a man-made situation which could easily be controlled, saying management was in a better position to give an explanation over the matter.

Ncube said the policy was there that hospitals should not be loadshedded but he could not say they wouldn’t be because he did know how the water situation runs on a day to day basis.

The times Zambia is going through are very hard, not easy at all, but there are just certain things which are a necessity regardless of the situation. Ncube has correctly put it that there is a policy not to loadshed the hospitals. We thought he would say that the utility company he is leading would work to ensure that the policy was effectualised so as not to risk the lives of the many patients in various medical centres in the country.

There have been proposals for instance to limit exports of electricity in order to lessen the very long load shedding hours of 12-hours, if not more, Zambians are enduring every day for instance. More so if this were done in limiting the same exports in order to prioritise the health facilities in the country.

The parents for the deceased child said the power blackouts at the hospital were compounded by the fact the standby genset the facility relies on also ran out of diesel. They say efforts to buy the fuel for the genset was not purchased on time as the people to authorise payment for the purchase were not around. We thought this should have been a huge story actually requiring the government into action by putting management at the hospital on spot. We would by now be hearing about the action the government had taken not only with regards to the management, but also the measures put in place to ensure that what happened in Lundazi does not replicate elsewhere. In fact we can say with a certain sense of confidence that the tragic incident at Lunduzi District Hospital was just a tip of the iceberg in terms of the havoc these blackouts are having on the nation, particularly the health facilities.

Rather than Ncube saying he cannot guarantee if hospitals will be load shedded, he must actually be telling the nation that there would be harsh penalties on his management if they failed to effectualise the policy banning electricity blackouts in hospitals. This should be done even with the crippling loadshedding schedule the country is enduring. There are just certain things that normal nations don’t allow.