Speaker demands Emergency Care Law after engineer’s death sparks national outrage

The Speaker of Parliament, Alban Sumana Kingsford Bagbin, has called for the urgent enactment of an Emergency Care Law to address what he described as needless deaths of accident victims at health facilities across the country.

He said such legislation would ensure that negligent health workers are held accountable and prevent what he termed recurring misconduct within the healthcare system.

“There are many examples of these needless deaths in this country and the same people, when you see them working outside, their attitude is different, which means that there is something wrong here,” he said.

Mr Bagbin made the call following a statement by the Minority Leader, Alexander Afenyo-Markin, on the death of a 29-year-old engineer, Charles Ammisah, an employee of Promasidor Ghana Limited, who was involved in a hit-and-run accident on February 6 this year.

Speaker orders Parliamentary scrutiny

The Speaker directed Parliament’s Health Committee to examine reports arising from investigations by the Ministry of Health and the Korle Bu Teaching Hospital and to interrogate their findings thoroughly.

He stressed that the circumstances surrounding Mr Ammisah’s death had become a matter of national concern and must not be left solely to the Ministry of Health or the hospitals involved.

“We have to take control and we need to enquire further into the matter and we need to hold people accountable. This is one of the needless deaths we have experienced in this country.

“At the end of the day, the Minister of Health, together with the committee, will have to come before this House and then we can take that opportunity to legislate on the matter and try to bring finality to these needless deaths in our country,” he said.

Mr Ammisah was reportedly involved in a hit-and-run accident at the Circle Overpass in Accra and later died after allegedly being turned away from several health facilities.

Call for probe and sanctions

Citing Article 103 of the 1992 Constitution, Mr Afenyo-Markin said Parliament had a constitutional duty to investigate matters of public importance and expose inefficiency and maladministration.

He called for the Health Committee to be immediately empowered, under the Speaker’s directive, to summon the Chief Executive Officers and Heads of Emergency Units of the three hospitals involved.

He further urged the committee to demand the production of triage logs, duty rosters and bed occupancy records for the night Mr Ammisah died, and to determine whether the 2018 Ghana Health Service directive prohibiting the denial of emergency care was breached.

“If misconduct is found, sanctions must follow and if negligence is proven, prosecution must follow.

“If a systematic failure is identified, comprehensive reform must follow,” he said.

Delivering an emotional appeal, he added: “If a young man can be carried from one public hospital to another, refused at every door until he dies, then the social contract is broken and none of us is safe”.

“Not the rich, not the poor, not the politician, not the ordinary man on the streets; the death of Charles Ammisah must force this nation to change, as human life cannot be subordinated to administrative convenience.

“Emergency cannot be optica,l and our hospitals do not have the moral or legal discretion to abandon the dying,” he said.

‘Stop politicising sensitive matters’

While acknowledging the difficult conditions under which many health workers operate, Mr Bagbin insisted that patriotism and professionalism must prevail.

“Patriotic health workers have done that and people have survived through that. So please, the few that are miscreant should not be allowed to at least carry the day since that is what has been happening,” he said.

Responding to concerns about political responsibility for systemic lapses in hospitals, the Speaker urged citizens to demand accountability from elected leaders.

He also cautioned Members of Parliament against politicising the issue, warning that “sometimes you forget you could be the one”.

Systemic failure alleged

Explaining the rationale for a parliamentary probe, the Minority Leader described the incident as a “systemic failure of the state”.

He said Ghana’s healthcare system, which citizens turn to in their most vulnerable moments, had failed Mr Ammisah fatally.

According to him, at 10:32 p.m., the Ghana Ambulance Service received a distress call, mobilised at 10:33 p.m. and arrived on site at 10:35 p.m.

The ambulance team, he said, found the victim bleeding profusely but with a fighting chance of survival. They stabilised him, controlled the haemorrhage and “rushed him to the gates of hope”.

“But hope, Mr Speaker, was met with a closed door,” he said.

He alleged that personnel at the Police Hospital, the Ridge Hospital and the Korle Bu Teaching Hospital declined to admit the victim on the grounds that no beds were available.

“At none of these facilities was triage conducted and at none were vital signs even taken and Charles Ammisah remained in that ambulance, his life ebbing away while the institutions established by the Republic of Ghana to save him refused to receive him,” he said.

After approximately 30 minutes, Mr Afenyo-Markin said Mr Ammisah went into cardiac arrest despite efforts by the ambulance crew to save him.

“He was pronounced dead; a life extinguished not by the initial accident but by a systemic failure of the state.

“Mr Speaker, this House must particularly be outraged because this was not merely an accident of circumstances as it was a direct violation of state policy,” he said.

He recalled that in 2018, under the leadership of the then Director-General of the Ghana Health Service, a directive was issued explicitly prohibiting the denial of emergency care on the basis of bed availability.

“The directive was unequivocal as it mandated immediate triage, immediate stabilisation and the use of alternative surfaces, couches, tables, wheelchairs, and where beds were unavailable,” he said.

“Contrary to the principle of stabilising victims, such principle was abandoned,” he added.

He also urged the Ghana Police Service to deploy every available investigative resource to track down and apprehend the hit-and-run driver.

Majority Leader demands accountability

Contributing to the debate, the Majority Leader, Mahama Ayariga, recounted how he had once survived an accident due to the intervention of health personnel at the Tamale Teaching Hospital.

However, he lamented what he described as growing indiscipline, disregard for human life and lack of empathy in some health facilities.

“We must be outraged about a thing like this and I believe that we must get to the bottom of matters like this and Parliament, at all times, must hold those responsible for such conduct to account,” he said.