Controversy has trailed death of a chartered accountant and auditor, Alhaji Muideen Obanimomọ, who died in the University of Ilorin Teaching Hospital (UITH) of suspected coronavirus (COVID-19) disease.
While the Kwara State government has denied the story through the chief press secretary to the governor, Rafiu Ajakaye, the UITH management through a statement signed by the Chairman Medical Advisory Committee for the UITH, Dr Aishat Saka, described the process of admission and conduct of medical personnel connected with the treatment of the deceased as “highly unethical”.
Alhaji Obanimomo, who reportedly arrived from the UK to the country 12 days before admission to the hospital, was said to have died on Thursday, April 2, 2020, of food poisoning, with reported symptoms of Coronavirus.
The statement by the hospital management reads:
A 57-year old, male, Muslim patient was brought into the UITH’s Accident & Emergency Department on the night of Wednesday, April 1st, 2020 in the company of one of the hospital’s Professor of Internal Medicine (a specialist in infectious diseases); with history of abdominal discomfort/stooling, following ingestion of rotten pineapples. He was then admitted and managed as a case of ‘food poisoning’. The patient later died in the early hours of the following day, 2nd April 2020.
“Following the patient’s death and release of his corpse to the managing professor (who also claimed to be his relative) for immediate burial (in accordance with Islamic rites), the hospital management received several anonymous calls disclosing information of recent travels by the patient and his wife to the UK and having been on self-isolation on arrival to Ilorin 12 days prior presentation at A&E (on the advice of the Professor who brought him) – information that was concealed from the frontline medical personnel at first contact in the A&E, A&E Attendants and the mortuary staff; acts that the hospital’s management considered highly unethical!
“Based on this hidden and additional information, the hospital’s management and the UITH’s COVID-19 Committee immediately swung into action by doing the following:
- The case was labelled a ‘suspected case’;
- Immediate notification to Kwara State COVID-19 Committee Response Team;
- Proactive fumigation of the hospital Medical Emergency Department;
- Proactive advice for self-isolation of close contacts of the patient while in the hospital & their follow-up by UITH’s COVID-19 Team;
- Collaboration with Kwara State COVID-19 Response Team on Contract tracing in the Community;
- Collection of laboratory samples from the deceased’s wife, the professor, and all others identified as ‘very high-risk contacts’ using National COVID-19 Guideline; and
- Institution of other measures at every point of clinical services to protect health care staff in the frontlines and other, in cases of deceptions from clients with probable symptoms of COVID-19.
“The hospital is therefore thankful to these anonymous callers for this vital/critical information. The hospital hereby advises the general public to provide necessary and timely information that will aid appropriate care, services, and prompt response from health workers in the hospital.
Meanwhile, the Kwara state government has denied that the state has recorded a case of coronavirus (COVID-19), adding however that all the six samples of suspected cases so far tested in the state have been negative.
“The Kwara State Technical Committee on COVID-19 wishes to clarify that the state has not recorded any confirmed case of COVID-19. As of now, all the six samples tested from Kwara State have returned negative,” Rafiu Ajakaye, spokesman of the Kwara State Technical Committee on COVID-19, said in a statement in Ilorin.
“The committee states that there is no fact, at this moment, to support suggestions that a male patient who died on last Wednesday night at the University of Ilorin Teaching Hospital was a COVID-19 patient,” it added.
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