Is The Health Worker Your Only Culprit?

Let us be careful not to shift the blame entirely in this "no bed" tragedy to our hardworking medical doctors and nurses. The health practitioners may be responsible for 10% (at most) of the problem, but 90% or more of the mess is as a result of the bad leadership we have been cursed with for decades. I know some health workers have been reckless, but that is the exception and not the rule. We have a bigger problem, and that is the failure of our governments over the years to address the critical issues of the state. Almost every sector is worsening. For example, the Kete-Krachi Local Authority Primary School and the public junior high schools that gave me the foundation to get this far in life are worse than they were in the 1990s.

Our health system appears to be worse because it is about life and death. If you enter a typical hospital environment in Ghana, you feel like throwing up. Some consulting rooms in some public hospitals are not fit for garbage cubicles in some countries. That is where our health workers sacrifice and improvise sometimes putting their own lives at risk. In some cases, nurses deliver babies without hand gloves. So let us not destroy them further with our hurtful words. We have messed up our systems and continue to mess up. The citizens are not left out either. We have blindly (sometimes stupidly) contributed to this mess by prioritising politics and tribalism over our very survival.

We have reached a stage in our national life where we have to wake up and correct this mess or we may confront a rude awakening, a catastrophic social revolution, in the near future. Wagging of tongues and bastardising health workers will not solve this problem. The middle and upper classes should not look on because they think they are free from the suffering of the masses. I know when we talk about the mess in the health sector, some people don't experience it often. Apart from the politicians, a good number of people with good incomes patronise private health facilities. But we still have to be concerned about the plight of majority of the people.

I have seen and heard politicians and people of influence trying to give solutions. Their solution is what to do in the absence of beds. But is it acceptable to live in a country where health care delivery has to be improvised?

Our leaders should think. They should be a bit selfless and act in the interest of the people. Before they sign any contract, they should stop thinking about how their proceeds from that contract will insure their great grand children against poverty. They should think that any money stolen will eventually deprive someone of education or healthcare or employment. They should care about the real solutions to our healthcare problems.

The systems have broken down because politicians have seized control of every sector. A CEO or director of a hospital does not need to attain their position by merit. They have to be affiliated to a political party which is in government. When they get there, they know who they owe their allegiance -- the government, not the people. When you travel to Europe, America or to some parts of Africa, you are bound to see the tragedy of our republic called Ghana. We have sunk so low that we surely have lost the right not be looked down on by the advanced world. We are plunging into an irredeemable abyss of damnation. And those who think they are safe may be the worse victims of our collective irresponsibility.

Health is a matter of neccessary choice.
To my co health workers: its time for us to speak for the society to know, we are not the cause of deaths and unfortunate incident at the hospitals.

*We shall never give up on our hardwork*
We will serve our beloved patients with dignity, care and respect.

Your Health, Our Concern
Your health, Our Priority.
Youth Activist & Health educator
Apaw Russell Adu
[email protected]