The Management of the Tema General Hospital has said that it will launch investigations into a recent controversy that saw two of it’s mortuary attendants seize a corpse from a family over the weekend.
The hospital in a statement issued on Tuesday [February 14], and signed by Dr. Kwabena Opoku-Adusei, Medical Director of the Hospital, stated that it had put in place official procedures for depositing and retrieving dead bodies from its morgue.
It noted that persons who do not follow the official procedure were involved in rather informal arrangements that do not bind the hospital.
There was drama at the Tema Community Nine Cemetery on Saturday, when two mortuary men from the Tema General Hospital aggressively removed a dead body from its coffin at the cemetery, over the refusal of the bereaved family to pay an amount of GHc 150 as undertaking charges.
The incident, which was a surprise to many, happened in the full glare of family members and sympathizers of the bereaved family, who had gone to lay their dead to rest.
In a state of shock, the sympathizers who had gone to the cemetery to mourn with the bereaved family, stood helplessly, as they looked on while the body was removed from the coffin by the two angry mortuary men.
Some family members at the cemetery finally contributed to pay GHc100.00 of the debt before the corpse was released to them for burial.
The incident has since been described as unfortunate by the hospital, but it said, “Management has set up processes to look into the case of the individual involved.”
It said any staff who brought the name of the Hospital into disrepute would be disciplined in accordance with the Code of Conduct and the disciplinary process of the Ghana Health Service.
It also warned that it would hand over any patient who attempted to abscond from the Hospital after recovery to the Police for legal action.
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(Via: CitiFM Online Ghana)
