The circumstances surrounding the sudden demise of my adorable spouse has compelled me to start a serious national conversation about indiscipline and our priorities in Ghana.
Sometime last year, the road from Pantang Hospital to Agbogba was tarred. Since then, that stretch has become a very busy street on which drivers of tipper trucks, ambulances, cargo trucks and all types of vehicles shorten their journeys to Adenta, Aburi, Abokobi, Madina among others, to Agbogba Cemetery Junction area.
The smooth road has become an incentive for over-speeding in spite of a sharp curve after “Boller Junction” (as the place is popularly known), to the Silver factory area. Several accidents have occurred in the sharp curve section of the road.
I therefore made several calls for the community to mobilize residents to press the Ga-East Metropolitan Assembly (GEMA) to introduce some speed ramps to compel drivers to slow down in the heavily populated area.
Things became worse when a food vendor decided to build a kiosk to sell cooked food right within the curved area of the road. Vehicles are parked in that section of the road and in front of my house by drivers and motor bike riders who want to buy food. This has imposed risks due to the number of parked means of transport in that curve, whose owners want to procure food or eat at the spot in a makeshift canteen. Other security risks cannot also be ignored.
I personally drew the attention of the GEMA authorities to looming dangers and deteriorating security issues to no avail.
This was the very section in which an accident occurred on 21st November in the afternoon when a refuse tricycle that was speeding, hit my fence wall and knocked down a number of people with blood oozing from victims of the incident.
The loud bang drew my wife from the kitchen where she was cooking, to the accident scene. The bloody sight resulted in shock, collapse and eventual death of my spouse after all attempts to resuscitate her failed at the Pantang Hospital where she was rushed to by neighbors and eye witnesses.
Vital time was lost and I cannot discount possible poor handling after the collapse.
No one has knowledge of CPR techniques which could have given us more positive outcome immediately after the accident and on the spot at a moment when timely intervention was critical.
We can argue that the over 2,000 dollars needed for a mobile defibrillator for resuscitation is beyond the means of government to set up resuscitation centers in communities around the country. However, the cheaper and equally effective alternative of getting health personnel, especially the National Ambulance Service personnel to train first respondents in CPR skills and proper handling of accident victims in various communities, work places, schools ,church communities , shopping centers and markets has not been explored and effectively executed. This is where we must show that we are fiercely pro- life as a people.
In Japan, even from basic school level to universities, work places, shopping centers, churches, within social clubs and at transport hubs, and sports facilities ,among others, people are taught these life- saving skills and many people who would have become statistics have been saved.
Is someone listening? Is this alternative beyond our means? Let us start a crusade now fellow Ghanaians!
By Samoa Akwei