Hospital begs Taraba govt to takeover medical bill of victims

Medical officer, Santa Maria Catholic hospital in Bali Taraba state, Mr. Isaac Akperekpe has appealed to the Taraba state government to takeover medical bills of victims of crisis in the area.
Akperekpe who made the appeal on Tuesday in Bali said the hospital has ran out of medical stocks to treat victims of crisis in the area, saying the hospital can no longer afford to treat victims of crisis on admission.
The medical officer noted that the victims mostly Tiv farmers had just return to the area from Benue where they ran for safety in the wake of the crisis in the area and had no money to pay their medical bills.
“We are a faith based organisation and many people preferred to be treated here. We had cases here that we could have referred them to other hospitals, but they refused to go on referral because they can’t afford to pay. They are poor victims of crisis who are managing to feed themselves.
“Our financial position is seriously coming down. We have exhausted medical stocks we have on victims of crisis and and we can no longer cope because of the volume of patients we do receive on a daily basis following renewed attacks on the returnees.
“We have three severe cases that we need over a million naira to treat, but we are just managing them because they don’t have money and we don’t have drugs to handle their cases,” he said.
The medical officer added that they have treated and discharged over 400 victims between 2014 and 2015 out of which 23 died while on admission in the hospital.
According to him the hospital has received over 100 victims so far this year and the number is still counting as victims are being brought to the hospital on a daily basis.
He called on security agencies, the government as well as traditional and religious leaders to put an end to the killings in the area.