This archive report was first published on 4 August 2020.
Nurse Dies Two Weeks After Giving Birth to Healthy Baby ¶
Stephen Okal Oketch, a 33-year-old man, is mourning the loss of his wife, Marianne Awuor, a 32-year-old nurse from Homa Bay County, who died two weeks after giving birth to a healthy baby.
Awuor, who was born on July 24, the same date as that of her firstborn child's birth, was a theatre nurse for almost a year and had worked at Rachuonyo hospital since 2014.
She contracted COVID-19 at 33 weeks of pregnancy and gave birth normally. Despite testing negative three times, her condition worsened, and she was moved to Kisii County Teaching and Referral Hospital due to a lack of specialists in her home county.
Oketch claimed that medics at the hospital neglected his wife when they learned she was infected, leaving her unattended from Friday last week. He also alleged that the hospital was on a go-slow due to unpaid salaries.
County Health executive Sarah Omache denied the reports of neglect at the Kisii facility.
Awuor's family has asked the government to investigate the case, with Oketch's father, Barack Oketch Amwata, saying that patients deserve care and their kin deserve to be treated with dignity.
The Kenya National Union of Nurses (Knun) has asked the county to provide nurses with enough personal protective equipment (PPEs) to minimize their chances of getting infected.
Earlier on Monday, health workers in Homa Bay downed their tools accusing the county of exposing them to the virus by failing to hire specialists for the ICU and other departments.
