In wake of a blackout at the New Amsterdam Hospital during surgery on a woman who later died, the Central Corentyne Chamber of Commerce (CCCC) yesterday called for a thorough investigation while urging President Donald Ramotar to address the power situation in Berbice.
“…Tirtawattie Shoandeo is probably another victim of the blackouts,” the CCCC said in a statement yesterday, while noting the account of her son that doctors were frantically searching for torch-lights after the blackout hit. “[It]… tells a tale of a country in the dark ages. In the 21st century this is simply too horrendous to contemplate,” it added.
The Chamber urged Minister of Health Dr Bheri Ramsaran to do a thorough investigation of this matter and make the findings public and that President Ramotar “most urgently” address the power situation in Berbice and bring relief to its residents.
According to the family of Shoandeo, 47, of Lot 129 Whim Village, Corentyne, and Berbice, as she was undergoing surgery on January 19th there was a power outage. The blackout led to a frantic search for someone to turn on the standby power. The generator operator was never found and surgeons and the woman had to wait until the power was restored an hour later. During the outage, the woman’s surgeon left the operating theatre on two occasions: to go to his car for a mini light and then shortly after he went in search of a flashlight. It is unclear if he found one.
Shoandeo was officially pronounced dead around 2 am on January 20th. Her family believes that the power outage in some way contributed to her death as lighting was not sufficient nor were needed medical devices operational.
The CCCC said that they had on previous occasions expressed disgust with the blackouts in Berbice but their “pleas beseeching and outrage have gone unheeded.”
CCCC feels that the administration of the hospital must explain why the standby generator was not fitted with an Automatic Transfer Switch, which would automatically start the generator whenever there is a blackout.
Minister Ramsaran has said that an investigation was launched immediately after the woman’s death and her medical and post-mortem records summoned. The post-mortem report, he said, showed that she died of kidney failure and that she had gallstones. He said that the woman also had an underlying illness. Even as the probe was launched into the incident, Ramsaran pointed out that he was “shocked and sickened” at the physical conditions at the hospital. The emergency lights of the facility had been without batteries for a prolonged period and there was cobweb in the ceiling.
In addition, he stated that while he did not believe that the power outage caused the woman’s death he wanted to know why there wasn’t an automatic power generator system at the medical institution and why persons had to manually turn on and off the generator.
Individual reports from various officials and the maintenance company also had to be submitted to the Minister of Health.
