The Management of University of Benin Teaching Hospital
(UBTH) has released a young woman who was detained in
the hospital for six months over unpaid bills.
IgbereTV gathered that the patient, Bidemi Taiwo was
admitted in the hospital on March 23, 2020. She gave birth
to a baby boy through cesearan section but lost the child.
Since then authorities of the UBTH detained her over non-
payment of the bills said to be over five hundred thousand
naira.
A lawyer, Jefferson Uwoghiren who took up the case,
confirmed the latest development on Saturday, October 31.
He wrote:
"Breaking!!!! University Of Benin Teaching Hospital, UBTH,
Benin finally submitted to superior reason this morning, as
Miss Bidemi Taiwo, has been Ordered to leave the
hospital. We demand the release of other similarly
imprisoned patients.
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Bidemi's father, a peasant farmer Mr Sunday Oyebamiji has
thanked the management of the UBTH for their magnanimity
in writing off the debt which, as at August 2020, accrued to
about six hundred thousand Naira. He also appreciated Mr
Jefferson and his team for their support.
Meanwhile, Mr Jefferson in a statement issued in Benin City
on October 29, said that it is a criminal offense to detain a
patient over a civil debt without court order.
He wrote:
"It is a criminal offense to detain a patient, in a hospital,
by hospital management, or their agents, due to debts
accumulated by a patient, in consequences of health care
treatment. Nobody, I repeat, nobody is permitted to detain
a debtor, over a civil debt, without the order of court,
which is unlawful.
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The management of UBTH, Benin City,
is liable in law, for false imprisonment, emotional distress
and agony, in a civil action, and of kidnapping, assault and
breach of public peace in a criminal charge. A patient and
doctor relationship is contractual, bound by the Law of
Contract. Doctors offer services to patients in legitimate
expectations of payments. Breaches or Inability to fulfill
contractual obligations, cannot result in the detention and
imprisonment of one party, in a private facility, by the
other, personally or by their agents, in consequences of
same. There is no law, that makes services provided by
doctors, either public or private, exceptional, and above
the Law of Contract. Let this victim of this idiotic,
seasonal and reprehensible breach of rights, now
languishing in UBTH Prison, get a lawyer, and sue the
Honorable Minister of Health, The CMD of UBTH, and
Matron, directly in charge of her detention for the past six
months, following her inability to fully pay her hospital bill.
#SHAMEUBTH Enough is Enough."
Jefferson Uwoghiren, Esq,.
29th October, 2020
Benin City."
https://www.facebook.com/100000877803683/
posts/3579067218799170/?app=fbl
See his posts below..
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