JUSTICE DENIED

Baby Hadiza had been in and out of the local clinic for the past six months. Born two years ago to a revered Islamic cleric in the village of Kida , Hadiza’s health continued to deteriorate despite spending over 15 weeks on hospital admission and taking all the prescribed medications her health was still far from normal. Several days later, the family was referred to the city’s General Hospital; it was at this  facility that baby Hadiza was diagnosed with AIDS, but how? Protested the Cleric, looking visibly angry and emotionally distraught but that was it, his little girl was HIV positive.

Subsequently, both parents were sent for HIV test but the results came out Negative.

However, going through the patient’s medical records, the medical team soon realized that the baby was diagnosed with Anemia 12 months earlier and was transfused with 200mls of blood. Could this be the missing link? Sharp practices and deliberate noncompliance with standard procedures among health personnel especially in rural communities have led to several loss of lives.

In developing countries, corrupt politicians and contractors also tend to compound these problems with the supply of substandard equipment’s, fake reagents and outright embezzlement of funds appropriated for the development of health facilities in rural communities. To them and their co-conspirators, the pandemic is a money spinning machine that must be milked at all cost.

Endemic corruption has ensured that funds appropriated for HIV programmes end up in private bank accounts, leaving patients without medications and the public without kits to determine HIV status.

The presentation of claims for awareness programmes and events that never took place is perhaps the most worrying aspect of this kind of fraud, as it completely denies the public the critical information they would sometimes require in order to make lifestyle changes.

These activities coupled with the insensitivity and outright noncompliance with standard procedures by some health workers has ensured that progress in the fight is consistently stagnated.

Today, the integrity of blood from blood banks in these areas remains a source of worry to many, while the locals have entrusted their lives to the hands of these few health professionals; some have betrayed that trust.

Quote

“Real integrity is doing the right thing, knowing that nobody’s going to

know whether you did it or not.”

—Oprah Winfrey