Tuesday, 24th February, 2026
Hon Alexander Kwamena Afenyo-Markin
Effutu
Mr Speaker, that is so. Mr Speaker, I rise in this Chamber with a heavy heart, weighed down by grief, with a spirit stirred by righteous indignation and with a profound sense of national covenant broken.
We must today confront a truth as painful as it is undeniable. Our health care system, the sanctuary to which citizens flee in their most fragile hour, failed. It failed catastrophically and fatally. Let me be emphatic. This is not a partisan matter. Therefore, this Chamber must not descend into the usual theatre of political point scoring. It is not about the National Democratic Congress (NDC) nor the New Patriotic Party (NPP). This transcends political advantage. This is about a human being, a young Ghanaian citizen.
His name was Charles Amissah, a 29-year-old man in the prime of his life, reportedly employed by Promasidor Ghana Limited, who, by every moral and legal right, should be alive today. Instead, he perished. He died in the back of an ambulance, virtually on the streets of our capital city, because the institutions mandated to protect life turned him away. Mr Speaker, on 6th February, 2026, Charles Amissah was involved in a hitand-run accident at the Circle Overpass. At 10:32 p.m., ambulance 15 received a distress call. At 10.33 p.m., it mobilised. At 10.35 p.m., it was on site. Let the record show that the Ghana Ambulance Service performed its duty with professionalism and dispatch.
They found him bleeding profusely. They assessed him. His vital signs were recorded: blood pressure, 120/90. Pulse was 100 beats per minute. Oxygen saturation was 99 per cent. These were the vital signs of a living man, a man with a fighting chance. They stabilised him, controlled the haemorrhage, and rushed him to the “Gates of Hope.” But hope, Mr Speaker, was met with a closed door. At the Police Hospital, they were told, “no bed”. At the Accra Regional Hospital, Ridge, the answer was the same: “no bed”. At the Korle Bu Teaching Hospital, our premier medical facility, they were rejected again. Let us be clear on what this means. None of these facilities conducted triage. No vital signs were even taken.
Charles Amissah remained in that ambulance, his life ebbing away while the institutions established by the Republic of Ghana to save him refused to receive him. After approximately 30 minutes of this shameful odyssey, he went into cardiac arrest. Despite the effort of the ambulance crew, cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) yielded no response. He was pronounced dead. A life extinguished, not by the initial accident, but by a systemic failure of the state.
Mr Speaker, this House must be particularly outraged because this was not merely an accident of circumstances; it was a direct violation of state policy. In 2018, under the leadership of the then Director-General of Ghana Health Service, a clear directive was issued explicitly prohibiting the denial of emergency care on the basis of bed availability. The directive was unequivocal. It mandated immediate triage, stabilisation, and the use of alternative surfaces, couches, tables, wheelchairs, and where beds were unavailable. The principle was and remains simple. Stabilise first. Resolve bed logistics later. In the case of Charles Amissah, that principle was abandoned, and the man died as a result.
Mr Speaker, before I proceed further, it is right and proper that we pause. We must look beyond the policy failures and statistics and see the face of a young man who we have lost. I wish, on behalf of my Side of the House, and I believe I speak for every Hon Member present, to extend our deepest, most heartfelt condolences to the family, friends, and colleagues of Charles Amissah, who now face an unthinkable void. To his siblings, his loved ones, and his colleagues at Promasidor Ghana Limited, we share their immeasurable grief.
Nothing we do here today, Mr Speaker, will bring Charles back, but let it never be said that this Parliament heard of such a tragedy and remained unmoved. This is the reason I am grateful for this treasured space to make this Statement. Furthermore, Mr Speaker, while we hold our public institutions to account, we must not lose sight of the fact that this tragic chain of events was set in motion by a cowardly act.
A hit-and-run driver struck down Mr Charles Amissah and fled the scene, leaving him for dead. I therefore call upon the Ghana Police Service to deploy every resource, every investigative technique, and every intelligence capable at their disposal to track down and apprehend this individual. Justice for Mr Charles demands that the person whose reckless actions precipitated this nightmare be found and made to answer fully before the law. Let them know that the long arm of the Ghanaian state will not tire until they are brought to account.
Mr Speaker, I respectfully invite this honourable House not to be silent over this. We must act now. We are informed that the Ministry and the Health Facilities Regulatory Agency (HeFRA) have launched investigations. We welcome these actions, but let no one mistake Executive inquiry for parliamentary oversight. Under Article 103 of the 1992 Constitution, this House has the primary duty to investigate matters of public importance and to expose inefficiencies and maladministration.
Therefore, in all humility but with firmness of mind, I call on the Committee on Health to be immediately empowered to do the following, and Mr Speaker, with your directive: Firstly, summon the chief executive officers and heads of emergency units of the three hospitals involved; secondly, demand production of triage logs, duty rosters and bed occupancy records for that night; thirdly, establish conclusively whether the 2018 Ghana Health Service Directive was breached; and finally, determine whether professional misconduct or negligence occurred. If misconduct is found, sanctions must follow. If negligence is proven, prosecution must follow. If a systemic failure is identified, comprehensive reform must follow.
Mr Speaker, let me leave the House with these final thoughts. If a young man can be carried from one public hospital to another, refused at every door until he dies, then the social contract is broken and none of us, I repeat, none of us is safe, and neither the rich, nor the poor, nor the politician, nor the ordinary man on the streets.
Mr Speaker, the death of Mr Charles Amissah must force this nation to change. Human life cannot be subordinate to administrative convenience. An emergency cannot be optical. Our hospitals do not have the moral or legal discretion to abandon the dying.
Mr Speaker, I so humbly submit. Thank you so much indeed.
Hon Grace Ayensu-Danquah
Essikadu-Ketan
Thank you, Mr Speaker, for giving me this opportunity to comment on the Statement made by the Hon Minority Leader.
Mr Speaker, the death of any Ghanaian in this matter is unfortunate. I would like to take this opportunity to extend my heartfelt condolences to the bereaved family and the loved ones of the deceased and also to the entire nation.
Mr Speaker, I am the Deputy Minister for Health and also a traumatologist. In other words, I am trained as a trauma surgeon specialist and consultant. The event that led to this unfortunate incident and the demise of the gentleman is tragic and should not have happened. In surgery, we call this a “never event”. A never event is an event that should never happen. Under no circumstances should a human being die this way; however, governance is a continuum.
Mr Speaker, as the Hon Minority Leader said, the Ministry has constituted a committee that is looking into the issue. In fact, they met today. We have also done preliminary inquiries. As we all know, I believe that the management of Korle Bu Teaching Hospital has also independently interdicted some of the workers who were in the emergency room that night. However, the conditions under which the current Government came into running the country were rather dire when we talk about our health system.
Mr Speaker, the previous government started the Agenda 111 Project, and at the end of eight years, there was not one single hospital. [Interruption] I am not engendering debate. I am just trying to explain the circumstances. Mr Speaker, on Agenda 111, at the end of eight years, there was not a single hospital that was operational.
In fact, what we came to meet were multiple hospitals littered around the country with some of them at the foundation level. There was not one hospital that a human being could walk into; however, they had spent millions and billions of Ghana cedis. To the extent that the Auditor-General surcharged 35 contractors GH₵ 7.9 million, and the refund that the Auditor-General surcharged — Thank you, Mr Speaker. I am guided.
Mr Speaker, the current government is serious about what is happening in our emergency rooms. We have constituted a committee that is looking into it. We are collecting data as to what is actually happening in our emergency rooms. Mr Speaker, the issue is multifaceted. Is it the pre-hospital, the ambulance, the pre-hospital care, or is it indeed what is happening in our emergency rooms?
Mr Speaker, regarding the Ambulance Service, we have 30 ambulances currently parked. In the last five years, the Ambulance Service personnel have not been recertified. The ambulance was there because of its proximity to the Ambulance Service. They got there on time, and they did what was necessary. Mr Speaker, the no-bed syndrome, unfortunately, is not a new issue. This issue has existed for so long, and unfortunately, the previous government was not able to fix it.
Mr Speaker, the John Dramani Mahama Government is going to take a bold step to solve the problem of no-bed syndrome. We are going to re-tool the hospitals, starting from the Communitybased Health Planning and Services (CHPS) compound to the health centres, all the way up to—
Thank you, Mr Speaker. By definition, an ambulance itself is a bed. An ambulance is what we classify as a step-down unit. The cart in the ambulance can be considered a bed, so in such cases, a patient can be treated in the ambulance. Yes. That is why we have constituted a committee to look into it, and that is why, Mr Speaker, we are retooling the ambulance service. It is because they need to have the proper equipment in the ambulance. I
t is not just the bed, Mr Speaker. It is the bed, the oxygen, the intravenous (IV), the IV infusion itself, the monitors and everything in the ambulance, Mr Speaker, an ambulance is not just a transportation device. Mr Speaker, we are retooling the ambulances— Thank you, Mr Speaker. As a Ministry, we are taking every step to ensure that such situations never happen in the country.
Mr Speaker, we are retraining our emergency services staff. We are both training the doctors as well as the staff. We are even training the security in the emergency rooms. We are also extending this into the ambulance service itself. We are going to ensure that all the ambulances have the necessary equipment to save precious Ghanaian lives. This patient could have probably been saved if we had the proper supplies in the ambulance. We are working diligently to avoid such needless deaths of any Ghanaian.
In conclusion, Mr Speaker, again, I would like to express my heartfelt condolences to the family and I would also like to express my condolences to the rest of the country. Under our Government, such incidences would not happen. Thank you.
Hon Kojo Oppong Nkrumah
Ofoase Ayirebi
Mr Speaker, I am grateful for the opportunity to comment on this Statement, and I join Colleagues in expressing our condolences to the family of Charles Amissah for this tragic loss. I also associate with the calls for a proper investigation to establish exactly what happened.
Mr Speaker, also, let me, on behalf of Members of Parliament who may feel like associating with this call I am about to make, apologise to the family of Charles Amissah for the comments that have just been made by the Deputy Minister for Health which, in our view, attempts to politicise the matter. This is a matter of a tragic death, a matter that has now been announced as a subject of an investigation. There should be no basis for which, at this time, there are attempts to suggest that it is because the immediate past administration did not finish Agenda 111 buildings or EMTs have not been certified.
If we descend into that arena, Mr Speaker, we may be tempted to ask what the administration before the last one also did about that. I am not sure what Ghanaians want to hear us talking about today is an attempt to be doing partisan exchanges on this. What is important is that this investigation is done and is done in a credible manner. What is important is that if some wrongdoing is found, the persons who would have engaged in it are held culpable.
More importantly, Mr Speaker, is an assurance that going forward, the emergency health processes that should take place in our health facilities across the country are very strongly observed. But, Mr Speaker, this happened in a very urban area where medical facilities are available, where medical personnel are available. Can we imagine what is happening in many of the rural communities where facilities and personnel are in short supply? So, across the aisle, we have to commit ourselves to ensure that no cedi should be spared in ensuring that facilities and personnel are made available across the country to be able to attend to the health needs of our people.
Mr Speaker, once again, we would extend our commiseration to the family of Mr Charles Amissah, but this should not be a matter that is politicised in any way whatsoever. Thank you, Mr Speaker, for the opportunity.
Hon Frank Afriyie
Afadjato South
Mr Speaker, I am so grateful, and just like my Colleagues, I would also like to use the opportunity to extend condolences to the bereaved family and to wish them God’s strength in this moment of grief.
Mr Speaker, at the heart of this whole thing, partly, is the response that we often receive from our health practitioners. I recall during last Meeting, one dawn I woke up to prepare for a television show, and suddenly I blacked out. I was fortunate my son heard the extent to which I fell and moved from his room to come to our master bedroom. He managed to wake my wife up. They lifted me to one of the foremost health facilities in this country.
Mr Speaker, when we got there, my younger brother went in and drew their attention. They just told him to send me to another place. It took my wife to tell them that the man lying in there is a Member of Parliament (MP). They then rushed in. So, the kernel of this issue sometimes is that the discrimination by these professionals. The discrimination they offer tends to make you and I, Mr Speaker, victims before the general public. I listened to a radio broadcast this morning, and none of us was spared.
Mr Speaker, not even yourself. The public holds an erroneous view that we are not doing much. Meanwhile, we are doing at least the best we could under the circumstances. But the response that comes from some of our practitioners, leaves much to be desired, and that is what we must focus on.
Mr Speaker, I think that the next thing for me has to do with the fact that we have overly concentrated our health facilities in Accra. And so be it professionals, equipment and tools, most of them are here. So, everything that happens in the other 15 Regions must come to Korle Bu or the University of Ghana Medical Centre (UGMC), and so it makes these professionals also overstretched. Governments must relentlessly look at that angle.
I am happy and delighted to know that at least under the administration of H.E. John Dramani Mahama, during his first tenure, he demonstrated an unwavering commitment to expanding some of this infrastructure. It is not enough. We must admit that we need to do more. We must engage and carry the public along and show that we are not a ruling class that is only interested in travelling to London, Germany, America, and other places to for medical treatment. But then we are doing our bit, and we must win their confidence.
This issue must not be left to go unchecked. I thank the Ministry and the Government for swiftly instituting, an investigation. The outcome must be brought in real time so that we take decisive steps to ensure that this does not rear its ugly heads.
Mr Speaker, I thank you so much for this opportunity.
Hon Fred Kyei Asamoah
Offinso North
Thank you, Mr Speaker. I would like to commend the maker of the Statement, Osahen Alexander Afenyo-Markin, the Minority Leader, regarding the passing of Charles Amissah. Let me also express my deepest condolence to his family.
Mr Speaker, it saddens my heart because just about three months ago, in my constituency, when I was called by the Police Commander that there was an accident that happened on the KumasiTamale Highway, specifically between Nkenkaasu and Akumadan. Right away, we were told some people had passed, so we had to rush to the hospital. I am happy to commend the director of the hospital because the facilities there were not enough.
Patients were treated at the outpatient department and they had to improvise. Any of us could have a cardiac arrest, and between three to five minutes, if we are not saved, we could pass. As such, our healthcare system should have a robust protocol that we use in managing health crisis or emergencies. We should not make excuses for a life lost. That is why, the former President said, we know how to bring back the economy, but we do not know how to bring back life. Any single life that is lost can never be brought back. This is not a time, as a House, to debate, but it is a time for us to improve on what the previous government started. If the previous government started constructing hospitals we should help. The case I am referring to, in Nkenkaasu they do not have an emergency unit, so I am using the small 5 per cent allocated to the Common Fund to build a small emergency unit to support the system.
Mr Speaker, there is no way one can say that we should have the same facilities we have in Korle-Bu Teaching Hospital in a village in my Constituency. But there are protocols that healthcare systems should have. The staff should be well-trained to understand what time to refer patients. But the excuse that because there are no beds people cannot be treated is not tenable. I believe if, for instance, our ambulances are not running, what is the Government doing to make sure we maintain these ambulances, that they are fit for purpose, and that they are working, Mr Speaker? Thank you, Mr Speaker. Respectfully, I do not intend to debate Mr Speaker.
But Mr Speaker, the point I am trying to emphasise is the fact that every single life matters. Whatever thing possible our healthcare system can put in place with respect to the limited resources that we have as a country, how best we can efficiently allocate them, and make sure that all staff and logistics that are in place are put to good use should be done. Because, Mr Speaker, it could happen to any of us. We know this is an issue of hit and run, which I believe the law will take its course. But also, let us assume this same thing had happened in another village, where there is no big hospital. What is the protocol?
In every hospital that I know, Mr Speaker, there are protocols that one has to follow. Are we making sure that all our healthcare professionals, or even Members of Parliament, are taken through CPR and such trainings? Basic things that even with our limited resources, we can still make use of.
Mr Speaker, we know healthcare facilities within the villages are not that bad. Healthcare professionals are able to improvise, because they have been given more detailed training, and have been trained that every life matters. We do not want to play with the life of anybody or do politics with the life of anybody, but we want to work on it.
As a House, now that such a thing has happened, I am also in support of the fact that we should institute a Committee that will look into the issue of Charles Amissah, so that another incident like that of Charles Ammisah’s does not happen to anybody, or any Member of this House.
Mr Speaker, with these few words, I thank the maker of the Statement.
Hon Titus Kofi Beyuo
Lambussie
Thank you very much, Mr Speaker, for the opportunity to contribute to the Statement.
Let me also express my deepest condolences to the family of the late Charles Amissah on behalf of all of us, and in particular, on behalf of the board and management of the Korle-Bu Teaching Hospital. Mr Speaker, I also want to thank the Minority Leader for this Statement. It is very timely, and he has set the tone for us to really examine the issues. Permit me to take us a bit down memory lane, to remind us of something that is not too pleasant.
In June, 2018, there was a 70-year-old man, Mr Prince Anthony Opoku Acheampong, who died after visiting seven hospitals, including a hospital that his company supplied stationery to. He was the CEO of a stationery company, and they supplied stationery to this hospital which turned him away. The explanation or excuse was the same. The then Minister for Health did his best, constituted committees to ensure that this will never happen again.
Unfortunately, eight years down the line, this time we have a younger and strong person, an engineer, losing his life to a similar circumstance. It is very unfortunate. But Mr Speaker, when we say “no bed” in the hospital, what actually do we mean? “No bed” could mean that there is no physical bed at the Emergency. It could also mean that there is no blood, if the managers anticipate that that patient will need blood, so they want the person to go elsewhere. It could mean there is no particular skill.
For instance, an anaesthetist is not there, and they think that that patient will require surgery. It could mean there is no theatre space. It could mean there is no oxygen in the hospital or there is no bed in the Intensive Care Unit (ICU), but they think that the patient needs ICU care. It could mean there is no bed for a stroke patient, therefore they are telling them that there is no bed because the person has a stroke. There is no doctor at this moment, so there is no bed.
Mr Speaker, the most disappointing part is that no bed could simply mean that the staff are not willing to work, and that is the very sad part. “No bed” could mean that a shift is about to end and someone is not willing to admit a new patient and do all the documentation, so they turn the patient away. “No bed” could mean that the doctor is afraid to work or is tired and feels that if he touches that patient and the patient passes away, duty of care is established legally because he has touched the patient, so see no evil.
He has not touched that patient, so we cannot blame him for it. But is it right that a patient dies in the precinct of the hospital, at the entrance to the emergency, waits there for 30 to 45 minutes, and they say that because they have not seen that patient, no duty of care is established? The legal brains will have to help us out.
Mr Speaker, the causes of “no bed” in this country have been established by previous committees under the former Minister for Health, Hon Kwaku Agyeman-Manu, and I worked on that committee in my former capacity as the General Secretary of the Ghana Medical Association. We all contributed to it, but still, the attitudinal problem and a few other factors have brought us this far. We can group the causes into structural, functional, and attitudinal. If we talk about structure, the World Health Organization (WHO) recommends that we should have about two to five hospital beds per 10,000 population.
In Ghana, we have 0.9 beds per hospital population, so practically, it can be that our beds are inadequate. When we go to the functional issue, we can say there is no bed in the emergency, but there may be a bed in another ward. It is just an attitude of transferring a patient to that ward, so we can create space, and people are not willing to do that.
Mr Speaker, as mentioned earlier, Korle-Bu Teaching Hospital, where I preside as the Chairman of the Board, was the last place that this man had his last breath, and we are very sorry about this. We have taken our own measures, we have interdicted four staff, and we have set up a committee to investigate. The Hon Minister for Health, as alluded to by the Deputy Minister, has also set up a very high-level committee, headed by the revered Prof Agyeman Badu Akosa, and they are working to see the exact cause of this particular incident.
But I am also proud to announce that to bring a comprehensive solution, building on the efforts of previous Ministers, the current Minister for Health has already set in motion a team to solve this situation comprehensively. And they are coming out with a document that will look at a National Integrated Bed Management and Referral Coordination System. This will be backed by Information Technology (I.T.), and it is going to allow us in real time to be able to tell the categories of beds that are available in a particular hospital. Whether there is a no- stroke bed, an Intensive Care Unit (ICU) bed, a bed for a pregnant woman, or a bed for a child; this work has been ongoing. It is unfortunate that while it was in its final weeks, this incident happened.
The Hon Minister has asked the group to quicken up their work so that he can make a major announcement on this to bring a comprehensive change that will help us. It will rope in the Ambulance Service, so that when the ambulance picks up a patient, they would not ask the patient or their relative, or a doctor in a small private hospital: “Can you tell us which hospital is willing to accept this patient?”
This is the current situation. I have had calls from a lot of Colleagues here; they need a patient moved to Korle-Bu, and the response would be that there is no bed at the Korle-Bu Emergency unit. But when I call, there will be a bed. Why? So, this is the solution the Minister is bringing, and I am pleading that Parliament will give the Minister all the support needed, so that this problem can be solved once and for all.
Mr Speaker, I will conclude by saying that our Ambulance Service, by its Acts and functions, may also need to be reviewed. Currently, they do scoop and run. What it means is, at an accident scene, they can pick one up, but they cannot even set a simple Intravenous (IV) line to give one fluid. For this patient who was being moved from hospital to hospital, if a simple, normal saline was running, this patient could have survived. The Minority Leader mentioned his Blood Pressure (B.P.) at the beginning.
At Korle-Bu, when they checked the BP in the ambulance monitor, it had come down to 84/56 mmHg. That is someone who is just about dying. So, if they could at least set a line and run some fluid in transit, a lot of patients would survive. So, the model that allowed them to only scoop and run must be changed. Their training must be upgraded so that they have paramedics who are specialised to be able to provide some basic care. But in conclusion, attitude is our biggest problem. All of this will not change if their attitude does not change.
May I stand on this to appeal to my colleague health workers, look at that next patient; it could be you, it could be your father, or it could be your mother. It does not have to be another doctor calling you before you create a bed and accept the patient. Because the one who can call maybe you, maybe the one unconscious, who will then call on your behalf?
Mr Speaker, thank you.
Hon Habib Iddrisu
Tolon
Mr Speaker, let me first of all commend my Colleague. He spoke with patriotism, deep knowledge, and professionalism of the Sector. He is the Deputy Minister for Health who never was.
Mr Speaker, listening to him brings me back to the conclusion of the Maker of the Statement. The Maker of the Statement concluded by saying: “If a young man can be carried from one public hospital to another, refused every door until he dies, then the social contract is broken, none of us is safe; not the rich, not the poor, not the politician, not the ordinary citizen.”
Mr Speaker, situations like this call for a deeper reflection. It calls for consensus-building, not to politicise the entire situation. I want to note that when we are given an opportunity, either as a Minister or a Deputy Minister, and a Statement is made with regard to a sector, any comment we make can be interpreted to be the knowledge or the position of the Government with regard to that sector.
Mr Speaker, I was happy that you drew our attention to when you were the Minister for Health, the number of ambulances we even had in the country was somewhere around 57. So, I want to call on the Deputy Minister and the Minister for Health that when a Statement of this nature is made on the Floor, we should not always be in a hurry to politicise the whole issue. It is very sad that if one goes into an emergency ward, one will be told that there is no bed, and, for that matter, one will lose one’s life. This is not the Ghana we all yearn to build. This is not the health infrastructure or the health priorities we want.
Mr Speaker, healthcare is a fundamental human right, the right to access proper healthcare, and it is one’s right to live. So, if the negligence of someone or the excuse that there is no bed will lead to the loss of life, it is something we all have to condemn. I also support the call by the maker of the Statement that we should build the capacity of the Committee on Health to be able to engage the management of these facilities so that we can build strong institutions, so that nobody dies due to the excuse that there is no bed.
Mr Speaker, I thank you so much.
Hon Ayariga Mahama
Bawku Central
Thank you very much, Mr Speaker.
Mr Speaker, I speak as someone who is alive today because when I had a similar emergency, the system worked for me. I had an accident somewhere in Nasia, around 4:00 a.m. I was struggling to get to the nearest hospital because even though I had no scratch on my body, the impact was so great that I thought something wrong must have happened to me. By some divine occurrence, an old Peugeot, which the villagers used to attend market early in the mornings was passing. It had eight passengers. I pleaded with them to open the boot of the car so that I would sit in the boot. Indeed, they came down and struggled to remove their spare tire and shift the spanners so that I could sit in the boot with my legs hanging outside.
I insisted I must get to the nearest hospital. Luckily, a brand-new pickup arrived there, and written on it was Navrongo Medical Centre. They stopped and checked. They mentioned my name and I was the one. They recognised me and asked what was wrong and I said I had an accident. It was around 5:00 a.m. So, they picked me and sped from Nasia to Tamale. By the time we arrived at Tamale Teaching Hospital, the health personnel were all ready, waiting for me because one of our Colleagues, the late Alhaji Limuna Mohammed Muniru, was then the Regional Minister and had called the hospital ahead of our arrival.
Mr Speaker, our Colleague here, Dr Anabah, was an anaesthetist. They transfused me with seven pints of blood that morning. They performed a surgical procedure on me, and apparently, I had started suffering from internal bleeding, from Nasia till Tamale Hospital, a journey of about two hours, I was bleeding internally. The doctor said if they had delayed for 30 minutes, by now, perhaps— Dr Anabah is a Colleague in this Chamber. Hon Muntaka was a Colleague at the time.
Mr Speaker, I speak as somebody who was kept alive because the emergency ward of a hospital worked for me, and it must work for everybody, every citizen. In some jurisdictions, their citizens would have been outraged. There would have been public outrage. Not the type that I see happening, that an accident victim was moved from hospital to hospital, and the medical personnel there refused to treat it as an emergency. It says everything about us as a country: the indiscipline, the disregard for human life, the lack of fellow feeling, that we do not see that this is a fellow Ghanaian, to whom, whatever we are doing, we must stop and attend to, otherwise, a life will be lost. We must be outraged about a thing like this.
Mr Speaker, I believe that we must get to the bottom of matters like this, and I thank my Colleague for bringing the matter up. I think that at all times, this Parliament must hold those responsible for such conducts to account. We talk about it, and then we leave it there. It happened in 2018. What happened? What did we do? How did those accountable fare at that time? This is what those who have done it today will be inspired by. They will talk; they will do nothing. We want to see action this time. We want to see people held accountable so that the rest of the health personnel across the country will know that this Parliament will not sit idly by while the negligence of some people leads to the loss of life such as what we have seen. So, I thank my Colleague for raising it.
Mr Speaker, I do agree with him that even though Government says it is setting up a committee to look into it, this Parliament should be interested in what happens. So, our Committee on Health should follow up on what Government is doing, and then bring us a Report, and if we are not satisfied with the outcome and the conclusions of Government, that this Parliament takes very drastic action. It is only then that citizens will know that when we converge here, we converge for their very existence. We are here to defend their lives, to defend their rights, and to defend their interests.
Mr Speaker, we say we should not politicise things, but permit me to say that who is responsible for the conduct of the health personnel? It is us the politicians. Who is responsible for making sure that they work in the environment where when there is an emergency, they will respond to it? It is us the politicians. Who is responsible for making sure that there are enough beds in the hospitals? It is us the politicians. So, when we say we should not politicise things, I agree that we should not be partisan about it, but the root cause is always political.
Mr Speaker, the point I am trying to make is that whatever is happening out there in the hospitals, whatever the attitude of the doctors and the nurses and the medical personnel, whatever the level of deficiencies in terms of the infrastructure, we in this Chamber, as the politicians, as Ministers, as Members of Parliament, are responsible, ultimately, because they voted us into office to deal with that problem. Are we doing that? Are we holding the health professionals accountable? Are we providing the infrastructure? Is the budgeting done properly?
So Mr Speaker, I do agree with you that the citizens put that in place, but exactly why they have put us there is to deal with these problems. I want to thank the maker of the Statement. I agree that there should be outrage. I agree that they should look into it. I also agree that Parliament must have an interest in the outcome of whatever investigations have occurred.
Mr Speaker, let me conclude by expressing my most sincere condolences to the bereaved families and to also express our disgust, our shame and our utter embarrassment at the conduct of our medical personnel. Thank you very much, Mr Speaker.
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