Pumwani Hospital Shocker: A Reflection of How Expectant Mothers in Kenya Are Put To Risk

Being pregnant in Kenya is becoming a risky venture for women especially those relying on public hospitals for services.

It is now becoming clear that becoming pregnant and your family not having enough money is the same as you and the child you are carrying being sent to an early grave.

Every time a mother in Kenya goes to a public hospital to deliver a baby, chances of her or her child surviving are always unknown and left to fate.

Stats show that in every 1,000 babies that are born in Kenya, 23 of them die as soon as they are born. These stats seem to be unrealistic though given the incident that happened at Pumwani Maternity Hospital on Monday.

On Monday, the governor of Nairobi County, Mike Mbuvi Sonko, “went undercover” at Pumwani Hospital and discovered bodies of 12 newborns that had been stacked in boxes and plastic bags. This means that 12 mothers had lost their children at the hospital in a span of less than one week if the sentiments given by the management are something to go by.

Records at the hospital indicate that averagely 3 infants die every day at Pumwani Maternity Hospital with the number hitting 1,498 in 2014 with at least 8 mothers losing lives during the same period. During the same year at the same hospital, there were 428 stillbirths, 704 neonatal deaths and 365 miscarriages normally categorized as abortions, meaning close to 3,000 lives were lost at this hospital that year. In 2015, the hospital lost at least 916 infants.

The stats above might sound outdated but just picked them to depict how grave the situation is in our public hospitals especially for our expectant mothers.  Will give the most recent stats as soon as we receive them.

READ: A Child Under 15 Years Dies Every Five Seconds Across The World

During governor Sonko’s ‘undercover mission’, some chilling revelations came out; Pumwani Maternity Hospital does not have a morgue. The facility does not have a cold room either. Now, this is a hospital that has been in operation for the past 60 years where hundreds of mothers visit to either being attended to during pregnancy or delivery.

The theatrics by the governor only mirrored where his administration has failed. It is like he went to inspect and display his own failure. The hospital receives hundreds of mothers every week with one or two doctors attending to them. The delivery room is in a sorry state and the operation room is in shambles. Given that the hospital is under the County Government of Nairobi and that it lacks a morgue as well as a cold room, the blame should lie squarely at Governor Sonko’s doorstep.

READ: 12 Dead Babies Found Stacked Together in Pumwani Maternity

According to the hospital management, the absence of a morgue or cold room has forced them to be ‘packing’ dead infants in cartons and plastic bags and put them in the storeroom to await collection to the City Mortuary. The management at the hospital says that the collection of dead infants happens on Monday, Wednesday and Friday. The hospital now says that it is putting plans in place so that ‘bodies can be collected daily.’

The sentiments by the hospital make it look like the operation that goes on either Monday, Wednesday or Friday is a collection of garbage and not human beings. As other countries talk not having an infant dying after birth, here we are busy deliberating on how best we can transfer bodies of dead infants on a daily basis to City Mortuary. It is sad.

Away from Pumwani, the truth of the matter is mothers in Kenya go through a lot of suffering when they want to deliver at our public hospitals. The case of a mother who was slapped by the nurses, insulted and forced to deliver on the floor in Bungoma Hospital is still fresh in the mind of those who care to remember.

The Ministry of Health released a report that showed that an expectant mother is likely to die if she checks in a hospital for delivery on weekends or after 5 pm on a weekday. According to that report, 72 percent of maternal deaths occurred during the weekend and weekdays after working hours. The report, given by the same ministry that should be making sure that such deaths do not occur said that the main reason that caused deaths was sub-standard care of expectant mothers in government hospitals.

The research which investigated a total of 489 deaths out of the 945 deaths reported in level four and level five referral facilities in Kenya in 2014, showed that over 80 percent of the deaths were caused by negligence and substandard care by the staff at the facilities.

We have had cases where mothers go into the operation room and a doctor literally ‘forgets’ scissors or cotton in the patient’s womb after an operation.