By Hassan Zaggi Correspondent, Abuja
Abba Mohammed being brought to Maitama General Hospital from Gwarinpa General Hospital for specialist care.
Emergency situations, whether major or minor, are part of human existence. In most cases, they cannot be avoided.
In recent years, Nigerians have come to terms with increase in emergency situations in the country. This has however been heightened since the emergence of the dreaded Islamic sect, the Boko Haram.
The increasing number of man-made disasters in the country has also put to test the level of preparedness of government agencies to contain such situations whenever they occur.
The recent bomb blast, which occurred at the Nyanya Bus Station at the outskirt of Federal Capital City, Abuja, on April 14, where 75 people reportedly died, has further opened another page in the level of preparedness of the Nigerian institutions to handle emergency situations.
Some of the relations of the victims who spoke with Sunday Independent Health noted that there has been some level of improvement in the response to disasters, “but the nation’s capital still needs more facilities in the event of mass disasters”.
A relation of one of the victims of the Nyanya blast, Yakubu Mohammed, observed that the response to the distress call after the Monday blast by emergency teams, was quick, “but people still need to understand that it is dangerous to mill around disaster spots”
Mohammed, an indigene of Kano State, is the brother to Abba Mohammed, who sustained serious injury on his jaws from a sharp object that hit him during the blast.
Some of the victims with serious burns were observably taken to hospitals, which were not equipped to manage their cases, and had to be transferred to other bigger hospitals such as Maitama General Hospital.
“My brother was first taken to Gwarinpa General Hospital, but was later referred to Maitama General Hospital for specialists care”, says Mohammed.
According to him, “After the bomb exploded, it was the pieces of iron from the shattered vehicles that hit and injured my brother on his jaws near the neck region.
“I am also into the okada business, but by that time, I had already dropped a passenger at the park and went to the filling station to buy fuel when I heard the sound of the explosion.
“I immediately left the filling station and came to the scene of the incident and we saw people running all over the place, as many others were being burnt by the fire and some already dead.
“While all this was happening, I never knew that my brother was among the victims. I then rushed home and asked if all of my brothers were back and I was told that Abba was yet to come back. We began to search.
“We later discovered that he was able to ride the motorcycle himself to the Nyanya General Hospital while bleeding profusely. The moment he entered the hospital premises, he was said to have fallen, but the hospital workers rushed over to help him and gave him First Aid treatment before transferring him to the Gwarinpa General Hospital.
“However, the hospital later told us that he would have to be transferred to Maitama General Hospital because his case is complicated and cannot be handled there.
“We even requested that we should be allowed to take him home (Kano) to one of our brothers, who is also a medical doctor to treat him, but they said no, that they can never allow us take him and they now brought us here to Maitama General Hospital”, Yakubu narrated to our correspondent.
Another eye witness account revealed that it was the promptness of the government agencies to the scene of the incident that saved most of the people who were caught in the inferno that followed.
“What saved the situation was the promptness with which emergency rescue officials came with ambulances to ferry people to the hospitals”.
According to Emeka Chukwu who managed to escape the tragedy, but helped with rescue mission, “The hospital workers also tried to save as many people that were taken to the emergency units but there appears to be some hiccups as the facilities were overstretched and the spaces could not take the victims; which means government still needs to do more to expand our hospital facilities to handle rescue missions”, said Chukwu.
Mohammed corroborated this, saying, “but for the prompt ways the nurses and doctors responded, many more people could have died. Even my brother, from the way he is now, if not that he was urgently attended to, he would not have survived”.
He was however miffed by the way and manner Abba, his brother, was transferred from one hospital to another, which, according to him, was due to lack of facilities for such magnitude of disaster in the capital of the country.
However, on his part, the Minister of Health, Onyebuchi Chukwu, who spoke on the level of preparedness of the government to respond to emergency situations, when he visited the victims at the National Hospital, said: “The pattern of diseases is changing. That is why we have been doing things as government to also increase the capacity for trauma”.
According to him, “As you are aware, the additional trauma facility at the National hospital is ready and we even used a bit of it during the bomb blast incident, but it will be properly commissioned in the next few days.
“That keeps us ready for any trauma situation, which has a capacity of 60, but it can even be expanded to 100. That was how it was built, but that does not automatically mean that once in a while, you may not have an institution overwhelmed”, he stated.
He acknowledged that there could be times when the degree of disaster could be overwhelming for the existing facilities, but added, “when you begin to get a pattern as we are getting now, normally, we will respond by increasing the facility. So, we have done that and we are still doing that”, he noted.
On the training of those that handle the rescue of emergency situations, he said: “Well, we have come a long way in Nigeria. The emergency response is far better in recent years in Nigeria.
“Since 2011, we have been responding very well, but of course, we can improve and that is why training has been continuous, even while we were preparing the curriculum for paramedics in the Nigeria which does not exist before now, we have been working with organissations such as the National Committee of the Red Cross to offer training.
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