Pain of getting RDC permit to hospital

On Friday morning, circulating photos of a woman with a broken leg in Kirabu Cell in Oli Division being carried on a wheelbarrow to Arua Regional Referral Hospital evoked sad emotions on the severity of pain the sick are going through to get to health centres following the ban on public and private transport.
The relatives of the woman said they had to hire a wheelbarrow to transport her to hospital after all their distress calls to the district leaders for a permit to drive the patient to the health facility were ignored.
A day earlier, Ms Doris Okudinia, a nurse at Ediofe Health Centre III in Arua, wheeled another patient-- a pregnant woman-- from a lower health facility, about 4kms away, to Arua Regional Referral Hospital. The Catholic Church-founded Ediofe Health Centre is in the outskirts of Arua Town.
Ms Okudinia said the health centre lacks an ambulance and the medics’ effort to secure one failed after several calls to the district did not yield a response.
“I wanted to save the life in this difficult moment because there was no other means of transport,” she said.
Apparently the pregnant mother was anaemic and could not be managed at the health centre. After the futile wait for seven hours to secure an ambulance from the district authorities, the nurse ran out of patience and embarked on wheeling the pregnant mother to save her life.
Several locals who have patients are finding difficulties in conveying them to hospital following the ban on both public and private transport.
“Some pregnant woman in Dadamu Sub-county called the Resident District Commissioner (RDC) at midnight. She was told to wait for morning. She ended up delivering at 2am this morning at home! What if something happened to her or the baby?” Mr Bernard Ojaku, a resident of Dadamu Sub-county in Ayivu County in Arua posted on his Facebook page on Thursday morning.
These are not isolated cases. In Gayaza, Wakiso District, relatives of Annet Bateta, a 31-year- old mother of three, from Kiwenda Village castigated police for denying her access to urgent medical services when her labour pains started.
Relatives of the deceased said when she went into labour, they tried to escort her to the nearest clinic on foot at around 8pm, but were intercepted by police and Local Defence Unit (LDU) operatives who ordered them to go back home.
The relatives said they pleaded with the security forces, but after failing, they returned home.
Police at Kiwenda Police Station were also accused of demanding money when the relatives sought permission to take the woman to hospital.
They went back home to look for the money and returned to the police station the following day. They secured the permission but it was too late. The pregnant woman and her unborn baby died on the way to Bombo Hospital in Luweero District. She left behind three orphans.
At Bulega in Nakuwadde, Wakiso residents were greeted by the sight of a mother who also died with the unborn baby after she collapsed, having walked for several miles going to hospital after failing to get an ambulance or vehicle to take her.
Ms Scovia Nakawooya, a 39-year-old mother of four, failed to access Mbira Health Centre III where she had been receiving antenatal care because there was no means of transport.
Ms Esther Lanyero was planning to travel from Kampala to northern Uganda where she had been appointed in Gulu Municipality on March 31. Her three children lived with their grandmother in Pece Division in Gulu. But the Covid-19 lockdown and curfew announced by the President on March 30, confined her in the capital. Ms Lanyero accepted to stay away from her family, quarantined in her room alone for the two weeks of the lockdown.
However, last Wednesday April 8, her nine-year-old daughter fell sick. The child had nose bleeding and fever.
“When I heard that Melissa was sick, I kept quiet on phone. My mum wondered if I was okay. I did not know where to start because I had heard stories from my friends of how difficult and stressful it is to obtain movement permit from the RDC,” Ms Lanyero said.
Calls to the RDC Santos Okot Lapolo, district chairperson Martin Ojara Mapenduzi, and Pece Division chairperson Kelly Komakech, were futile.
By Friday 3pm, the sickness had worsened and weakened the child. Lanyero called the RDC several times to get a movement permit to take her child to hospital using a motorbike but his phone was off.
The district chairperson reportedly made this telephone line busy and the chairperson 3, who had promised to call an ambulance, after 30 minutes, told her he had lost a relative and was making burial arrangements. However, he failed to coordinate for the ambulance and Ms Lanyero gave up.
“I broke down and lay on the floor in my room for about five minutes as I thought of the next option. I had a headache already by that time. When I called my mum, my daughter answered the call telling me she is in such a distress that her eyes could hardly open,” Ms Lanyero told Daily Monitor.
She called the clinic where her child could be taken for treatment under an insurance medical card but the facility did not have an ambulance either.
She was only rescued by a friend in Gulu who agreed to leave other patients in the queue at his clinic to drive and collect Lanyero’s daughter.
The child had acute malaria. She was treated.
The long painful and futile process of securing a movement permit or ambulance from district governments remains the agony of many families with patients at home.

Anger, frustration, and intimidation

Prevalence. These are not isolated cases, but prevalent across the country as people continue to suffer because of the negligence of those charged with responsibility.
The district Covid-19 response teams are accused of harassing people suspected of violating the rules on lockdown. Those who have emergency patient cases and try to move to hospitals without official permission are apprehended by the same authorities that failed to grant them the required movement in the hours of need.
Public rage is rising against RDC’s who have frustrated many people seeking movement to hospital.
Last week, government launched a fundraising drive to purchase at least 1,400 vehicles, with each district expected to get about 10 vehicles. Already a number of corporate organisations and businesses have responded to the call, donating brand new 4-Wheel Drive vehicles and billions of shillings to the government.
However, it is not clear whether such cars will save emergencies other than delivery of Covid-19 suspected cases.
Ms Okudinia, the nurse who wheeled the patient for more than 3kms to Arua Referral Hospital, is facing intimidation from the district security officials. Sources on the ground say top district officials have been threatening her with termination of employment if she speaks about her challenge. A source who spoke on condition of anonymity said Ms Okudinia is in hiding, fearing for her life.
“She has been receiving death threats from the security people in the district and I do not think she is safe. Even if you call her right now, she has switched off her phone,” the source said.
Our attempts to speak to Ms Okudinia about the alleged threats to her and her job did not yield a response as her mobile phone number had been switched off.
In a tweet, Dr Jane Ruth Aceng, the Minister of Health, described Ms Okudinia as a “true hero” and called the public to pray for such people who are at the frontline of saving lives.
Ms Esther Mbayo, the Minister of the Presidency, who oversees RDCs, did not answer our repeated calls.