A Savusavu man believes his wife died because there were no doctors or medical staff to attend to her when she arrived at the hospital.
Nacanieli Ramatau claims he rushed his wife, Adalyn, to the Savusavu Hospital at 5.30am on Sunday and could not find anyone in the emergency room.
“It was all empty and it took us more than 10 minutes to find the nurses,” he claimed.
“By that time my wife was struggling to breathe.
“We had to run around and into wards, calling out ‘nurse, nurse, doctor’ and after a while, they appeared.
“I believe if someone was there, my wife would still be alive.”
Mr Ramatau said they attended to his wife by using a nebuliser to ease her asthmatic condition.
“Whatever they did couldn’t save my wife.
“They had a small generator which supported all the equipment in the hospital, including the machine they used on my wife.”
Mr Ramatau said if the events leading up to her death were not bad enough, things got worse after she had passed. He claimed medical staff advised them to bury her the same day because they did not have a generator to support the mortuary.
“We couldn’t do that because our immediate family members were not around, including my parents.
“So we offered to provide two generators.
“They were given to keep my wife’s body until we can bury her tomorrow (today).
“It’s so sad they don’t have critical equipment like a generator.”
Mr Ramatau said it was hard to explain to his two sons — two-year-old Terry and one-month-old Judah that “mummy is no longer with us”.
Questions sent to Minister for Health on the concerns raised by Mr Ramatau remain unanswered.
