EDITORIAL: JFK AND ITS UNENDING INCUBUS

 THE JOHN F. KENNEDY Memorial Hospital, Liberia’s premium medical facility or referral Hospital, is once again in the news, not necessarily for the most thrilling reasons it was established in the 1960s, but for the very nauseating and disgusting conditions under which it is operating and subjecting patients to. What’s happening there is seen as a continuation of the sequence of incubus that span several years, mainly since the end of the civil war that left it in serious critical material, human setbacks.

IN FACT, IT IS no news the latest developments emerging out of the JFK – the new fee hike policy that has the potential to worsen already dire consequences patients are used to enduring while seeking medical solutions to their troubling health problems – because these conditions have reportedly been existing and even have led to the deaths and crippling of several Liberians. Every patient that went through the walls of the JFK has a horrifying story, ranging from nurses’ unprofessional, don’t-care and dehumanizing treatment of patients, advanced payments of fees before acceptance and treatment, buying of medicines, astronomical bills and many others. Some of those who experienced the ‘real JFK’ spoke of near-neglect at the height of their medical conditions – the state of complete breakdown. The death ratio there is said to be discomforting.

THE REALITY THE JFK management needs to know is that putting additional burdens on patients and family members through the new policy is tantamount to creating and facilitating conditions for patients or Liberians to die of inconsequential diseases due to the glaring financial difficulties at stake. There are patients still trapped in the hospital, in fact performing functions imposed on them by lack of money to settle discharge fees. A gentleman once confided in this paper that his fiancee who underwent cesarean section was on the verge of being put down from her bed until his church intervened, sparing him and the girl such scar of disgrace and embarrassment. “This was due to the fact that we could not pay the amount for the cesarean section or the total bill,” he said. The question the management must answer is how certain are they that every patient will meet the new requirements if the existing requirements have already proven to be nightmares for them. There are patients who cannot be discharged because of their inability to settle medical bills. There are patients turned back because of ‘no money’ at the moment of emergency. Why then increasing the financial burden is good for the Hospital?

NOW A DAY, NOT much is heard about patients or family members being billed and told to walk across the road to nearby pharmacies to get prescribed medicines/drugs – a horrible situation that existed and caused embarrassment to the nation. Lucky Pharmacy opposite the JFK was where patients or family members where directed to get prescribed medicines – one of the valetudinarianism that characterized the operation and administration of the leading national health facility. To date, there are reports that similar situation is happening but with it different company, B-Kay Pharmacy which the Hospital is said to be partnering with for medication. What is reportedly happening is that patients who are billed for medicines are paid to B-Kay Pharmacy agent at the mini payment booth, and a receipt in the name of the pharmacy is issued to the patient as proof of payment before medicines he/she obtains the prescribed medicines/drugs. This is done mainly to out-patients – those who go for check-ups and are told the get certain medications that suit their health needs.

IN ADDITION TO THE new policy that has backfired, these are some of the conditions patients go through on a daily basis, and it is unfortunate that Liberians are still talking and decrying them, instead of celebrating a new dawn of unhindered treatment, attention and services. It is incumbent on the government, considering the severity of the situation, to take immediate remedial actions, to save the Hospital from the debilitating incubus and give Liberians buoyant hope. If the biggest government-owned hospital is struggling to meet the health needs of citizens, how much more about private health facilities or the rest of the hospitals across the country. One hundred seventy years of existence as an independent nation does not march or commensurate with the socio-economic filthiness Liberians go through. JFK Hospital is meant to save lives; it is not to destroy them. The unending incubus is not good for the image of the country.

Alphonso Toweh

Has been in the profession for over twenty years. He has worked for many international media outlets  including: West Africa Magazine, Africa Week Magazine, African Observer and  did occasional reporting for CNN, BBC World Service, Sunday Times, NPR, Radio Deutchewells, Radio Netherlands. He is the current correspondent for Reuters 
 He holds first  MA with honors in International  Relations and a  candidate for second master in International Peace studies and Conflict  Resolution from the University of Liberia.