The avoidable death of citizen Moradeun

A young and promising lady, Moradeun Balogun, recently had her life cut short owing to dual lawlessness at two different levels. First was the attack she suffered in the hands of some outlaws who robbed her of her possessions and dealt a lethal stab to her in the neck. The second was the alleged refusal of a Lagos private hospital to offer her treatment because a police report was not produced. The young lady was a victim of a dysfunctional society where people tend to break the law with ease. It is really worrying that while the armed robbers’ sense of decency and legality was patently distorted by their single-minded pursuit of criminality, the hospital too has been accused of deliberately choosing to be on the wrong side of the law.

The obnoxious requirement to provide police report before medical treatment of victims of gunshots has been voided by legal provisions that mandate healthcare providers in the country to prioritise saving lives over any other things. For instance, section 20 of the National Health Act, 2014, provides that ‘Healthcare providers, health workers or establishment shall not refuse a person on emergency treatment for any reason. Violation of the law attracts a fine of N100,000 or a jail term of six months or both.” This provision is very lucid as the operating phrase … ‘shall not refuse a person on emergency treatment for any reason’ is all-encompassing and bears no ambiguity.

Yet, as if some hospitals and medical practitioners enjoyed wasting lives brusquely, they were, in the recent past, still insisting on police report before treating persons with gunshot wounds, leading, in many instances, to avoidable wastage of human resources. The veritable issue was that the law was hardly obeyed or diligently enforced. This was most unfortunate. And like a society which erroneously believed that every specific sphere of life must be legislated upon rather than observing and/or insisting on the enforcement of the relevant extant laws, the clamour for a specific law on the treatment of persons with gunshot wounds became strident. The call for a specific law gave rise to the ‘Compulsory Treatment and Care for Victims of Gunshot Act, 2017.’

This act is very explicit in its provisions. Specifically, it mandates hospitals in the country to accept and treat victims of gunshots with or without police clearance, while the security agencies are enjoined  to render the necessary assistance to gunshot victims and ensure that they are taken promptly to the hospital for treatment. The act also provides that all victims with gunshot wounds shall be treated without a request for initial monetary deposits and that such persons shall not be victims of inhuman or degrading treatment. It goes further to specify the sanction grid for breaches and the discretion of the court to cause restitution to be made by defaulters to the victims, in addition to the specified regime of sanctions.

Against the backdrop of the unequivocal position of the law, it is saddening that life is still being wasted cavalierly. The law is equally protective of hospitals and medical officials in the treatment of victims of gunshot wounds. Even if the victims turn out to be criminals, hospitals and medical officials are insulated from criminal charges as long as they apprise the police of the presence of the victims in their hospital within two hours of the commencement of treatment. In the circumstance, any hospital that rejects victims of gunshots or any other person on medical emergencies on account of the unavailability of police report is simply being unlawful, callous and unfeeling.

In other words, if indeed Citizen Moradeun Balogun’s eventual demise stemmed from the alleged negligence and refusal to give her requisite medical treatment by the Lagos private hospital because there was no police clearance, then the law of the land has been breached in a most painful manner that culminated in an irreversible damage. And the law should be allowed to take its full course. The law on the treatment of victims of gunshot wounds and the one forbidding hospitals in Nigeria from refusing any person on medical emergency treatment for any reason were purposely enacted to rein in wastage of lives in a curtly fashion, and on the altar of bureaucratic red tape that is patently irrational in emergency situations.  Meanwhile, the Lagos hospital in eye of the storm has denied the allegation that Moradeun was refused medical treatment, stressing that part of its core values is to prioritise safety of life.

According to the hospital, the victim was attended to by two of its doctors when she was brought in but an assessment of her case revealed the need for a vascular surgeon. This, it said, was why it referred  and evacuated the patient to the nearest hospital where such expertise was available. This line is diametrically different from the narrative that has gone viral in the social media which accused the hospital of culpable negligence and a breach of the extant law on the treatment of persons with gunshot wounds. It is, therefore, imperative to launch a painstaking inquiry into the unfortunate incident with a view to ascertaining the veracity or otherwise of the hospital’s claim and deal with the outcome in tandem with the law. That way, the relevant authority will be sending a clear message to all hospitals in the country that it will no longer take kindly to unlawful handling of a grave matter that is already settled in law.