By Hassan I. Conteh

The perimeter of Princess Christian Maternity Hospital which is well-known as cottage hospital is an eyesore as huge rubbish floats there.

PCMH is dominantly a women and children’s hospital.

Sierra Leonean pregnant women and kids usually receive medical services at the British established hospital.

Currently, huge rubbish lies in front of the hospital and has been there for weeks without being cleared.

It is good that authorities respond now early by clearing the dirt. Because if the rubbish stays there for longer hours, the smell, flies, rodents, cockroaches may cause further illnesses to those receiving treatment in the hospital.

That will result to several illnesses like cholera, diarrhea, malaria, typhoid, fever, and dysentery.

The smell from the rubbish will automatically causes airborne diseases. Health workers at hospital should urge junior workers to ensure that the dirt is removed in front PCMH.

“Since there are more rains now we pay the boys to clean up the gutters,” explains Alimamy, a seller on the road by the fence at cottage.

But, he added:  “We are still waiting on city council men to come and gather the rubbish.”

Selling close to a health facility itself is not good and it is a crime.

But, government municipal authorities and senior health workers at cottage are unable to put a stop on the street selling at PCMH’s perimeter.

The hospital is the oldest in the Sub-Sahara Africa.

PCMH was set up in 1892 by the British government when Sierra Leone was a British colony.

Millions and millions of Sierra Leonean parents have hugely benefited from this health facility.

The hospital also treats sick men, elderly as it has several divisions. But it has become to be known more to offer health-related services to unborn baby-carrying adults, mothers, and children.

However, the condition of services there becomes so poor soon after the civil war in Sierra Leone.

For example, there are instances of parents complaining of having given little drugs when they are discharged.

Under a Free Health Care, parents say they were not being provided with enough tabs.

They alleged also at the time that doctors and nurses kept hold of the drugs meant for their children, something which according to authorities is a criminal offence. No health authority was available to respond to the popular claims usually made by parents at the time of this investigation. We, Africa24, rely on direct observation about the services being provided at a children’s theatre within cottage.

Under the Free Heath Care, mothers should not pay for health services for children under the age of five.

Pregnant women are also expected to enjoy cheaper rate of services as provided by law.

But most times they are asked to pay a handsome of money for the services.

Though not huge enough, it affects the very poor who finds it even harder to buy one sachet of water, ‘grafton’ which is the common name for all types of plastic size water by Sierra Leoneans.

The Free Heath Care, an initiative by former president Koroma, faced with challenges such as some parents complaining of their children not being given proper attention by health workers.

PCMH is also still unable to address its water shortage within the hospital compound.

For example, the hospital went days without having regular supply of water over the past few years.

In 2021, Guma Valley, a public water services company, promised to fix the problem of water crisis in the hospital.

But, since that time, the problem of sanitized water is still unresolved.

Observing a children’s centre within cottage, there were plenty bundles of sachets of water bought by parents daily.

Though PCMH was sized to only provide services to not-too many pregnant women, cottage is filled with many pregnant and lactating mothers, adding the burden on doctors and nurses.

Most of the sick kids sometimes die from acute illnesses due to partially doctors little attention. And sometimes they die because of several failures—untrained young nurses giving the wrong advice to parents.

At our sight, a baby had been given the wrong oxygen tube, a harder breathed live supporting device.

Most often, on the other hand, the doctors and nurses blame parents for not taking much care of their young children while at home.

They would say children under five years are sometimes exposed to the cold breeze.

Infant children are mostly treated at a children’s centre named as Ola during, built around 2008.

The Ola During facility despite it is faced with some challenges, but it has helped to secure the lives of many children in Sierra Leone.

Many children have been born and treated there. The rate of maternity deaths too has dropped past the dark past years.

The dark years were the times when Freetown or the whole country was not having regular supply of electricity.

But now the problem of electricity supply is not as serious as was in the past.

But there are still challenges of few drugs supplied to Under Five under the current Free Health Care.

As more children are born, more should live than those who die. This happens when there is an efficient and effective health service is in place.

But that leaves the parents and others patients now to assess at Sierra Leone’s oldest hospital and Africa’s first hospital built by the British Crown Colony, PCMH.