Latest update February 14th, 2025 8:22 AM
Water woes halt operation at Leonora Hospital
Some of the patients in waiting.
The operations at the Leonora Diagnostic Centre ground to a halt early yesterday morning when doctors attached to the medical facility downed tools because of the lack of running water.
This newspaper was informed that the water dilemma first developed on Monday but was not rectified when the doctors arrived for work yesterday morning.
This prompted them to refuse to work.
By this time several patients had already trekked into the medical facility seeking attention only to be told that no doctor was available to deal with their concerns.
When this newspaper visited the hospital and queried the state of affairs, a hospital staff said, “We don’t have any running water and so the doctors are not working.”
About six doctors, including Cubans, are stationed in various departments of the hospitals and are tasked with tending to about 200 patients on a daily basis.
Guyana Water Incorporated (GWI) was alerted to the situation but according to Aubrey Roberts, GWI Divisional Manager, the problem was no fault of the water company. Roberts explained that the hospital receives its supply of water from the Leonora Well Station, a process which continued unhindered even up to yesterday.
According to the Divisional Manager it was discovered that there is a mechanical problem with the hospital’s internal pumping system. This resulted in its inability to send water to an elevated level of storage.
In addition to offering a temporary pump to appease the hospital’s dilemma, GWI through the Divisional Manager, was also able to secure the assistance of officers of the Leonora Fire Station who succeeded in pumping water to the elevated storage.
But although running water was restored to the facility before noon yesterday, Regional Health Officer, Dr Millicent Benjamin, had disclosed that additional efforts would have been engaged to address the purification of water available within the facility before the end of the day.
Benjamin said that she first learnt of the situation at the hospital yesterday morning and rushed down to the West Coast Demerara medical facility where a meeting with certain strategic officials was engaged.
It is the belief of the RHO that the situation should not have elevated to one where the doctors simply refused to see patients.
“This could have been avoided since we have porters who could have at least brought water for them to wash their hands among other things.”
She disclosed that although there was no running water, hand sanitizers and gloves are always readily available to the doctors.
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