Public flays Lagos Ambulance Service over boy’s death

A story of a five-year-old boy, Enoch Ibirogba, whose death was attributed to alleged unresponsiveness of Lagos State Ambulance Service’s officials, has sparked a wave of outrage from members of the public.

The majority of the readers of the story, which PUNCH Metro published on Friday, said the alleged unresponsiveness was an indication that governments at all tiers did not value humans.

A reader, who identified himself simply as Remi, wrote, “I feel sorry for the child’s father and it is sad that this young boy, Enoch, died because of bad leadership.

“In Europe, the kind of treatment available to a sick cat or dog is sometimes better than that available to humans in Nigeria.”

Another reader, Jay Dee, said, “Even in Mali, ambulance services work 24 hours everyday and everywhere. Emergency service is very active there.”

A comment by Yomi Ajiboye also expressed concern that Nigeria had not been able to establish an efficient ambulance service.

“What is there to depend or rely on in this country if an ambulance service can fail? This is too bad. The people at the ambulance service may know little or nothing about health. Something needs to be done fast,” he stated.

“It is a pity, human lives mean nothing to many professionals in Nigeria,” a reader named Muyiwa commented.

He said it was more saddened that the child could not get quality service from staff of the Lagos State University Teaching Hospital, Ikeja.

But not all readers heaped the blame on the emergency officials.

A reader, who identified himself simply as James, said security concern might have prevented LASAMBUS officials from responding at the time.

“We cannot blame the officials for their non-response in this kind of situation considering the hour of the day they were called. We cannot blame them because of insecurity in the country,” he said.

Another reader, Jay Jay, blamed the boy’s father, Olufemi Ibirogba, for not looking hard enough for a commercial vehicle to rush his son to hospital.

He was, however, replied in another comment by Dr. Ben, “Jay Jay, it appears you did not read the story well. By the way, do you live in Lagos?” He asked.

The boy’s father, Olufemi Ibirogba, had said he called the state’s emergency number, 767 around 12am on January 13 when his son had a health crisis in the middle of the night and he was repeatedly assured by a responder that an ambulance would be sent to pick his child.

He said after he waited for five hours, he went out around 5am and got a commercial bus which took Enoch to the hospital.

By the time he got the bus, the boy’s condition, according to him, had deteriorated.

Enoch died in the evening of that day at LASUTH.