Truck crushes girl’s leg, genital organs

The story of Maryam Olaotan is quite pathetic. It is one story that will draw tears to the eyes of a man with even a heart made of stone. The travails of the former student of Progressive Educational College, a private institution in Abeokuta, the Ogun State capital, started after an accident involving a commercial motorbike, otherwise known as okada. That accident claimed her right leg up to the hip, as well as her pelvis and a section of her external female genital organs.

Almost one year after the accident that has changed her future dreams, Maryam lies helplessly on a bed at the Federal Medical Centre (FMC), Idi-Aba, Abeokuta, praying for manna to come from heaven in form of financial assistance from public-spirited Nigerians.

Until Monday, July 5, 2010, Maryam was full of hopes and aspirations as she had just completed her West African School Certificate Examination (WASCE) and was preparing to write the National Examination Council (NECO).
A victim of the transportation problem in Nigeria, she was just about riding on a commercial motorbike to her destination when the bike was crushed by a granite tipper. Immediately after the crash, her right leg was seriously mangled.

The only surviving child of her parents, Maryam narrated her ordeal to Daily Sun.
Her words: “I was on my way to school on this fateful day and I had to trek from our house to Lafenwa area of the town.
“I had just flagged down an okada when the unexpected happened as a tipper loaded with granite on top speed swerved off the road to my direction and crushed my right leg.

“Immediately, I became unconscious and was taken to a nearby hospital for first aid. The okada rider lost his life instantly. I was momentarily unconscious and later woke up to find myself in the pool of blood in the gutter with several parts of my flesh torn off. I never knew it was of this magnitude; that was the beginning of my predicament. My right leg was amputated and parts of my genital organs were removed during the operation.’’

Sounding confident, Maryam said she is determined to bring out ability from her disability, adding that her dream is to become a medical doctor or a pharmacist.
“I am optimistic that I will achieve my goal in life once I am able to get financial assistance from kind-hearted Nigerians. I believe in God that He is all knowing and He can do all things. I am not wiser or more righteous than the okada man that was crushed to death on the spot. I believe I am alive because I have found favour in the sight of God.

“I believe this favour I found in Him will sustain me and carry me through in spite of this temporary setback. I trust in God that since He has made me to be alive, He has a purpose for my life and that the purpose will surely come to pass.”
Maryam’s mother, Mrs. Adijat Olaotan (43), described her only surviving child as a brilliant and hardworking girl, saying that the family had spent a fortune since the incident happened: “Within a week after we brought Maryam to the hospital, we have exhausted all what we have on her treatment. The doctors and nurses here have been assisting us financially too. No mother will pray to lose her child, not even in my case since Maryam is my only surviving child out of the three issues I had through cesarean operations. I prayed that well-meaning Nigerians should come to my aid to ensure she lives a meaningful life,”

A specialist, who spoke with Daily Sun on condition of anonymity, said that Maryam’s survival in the accident was a miracle:  “She has an acquired deformity. She has lost the entire lower limb up to the pelvis; her survival is a miracle. She suffered from severe crush injury of the pelvic and the thigh. The limb and parts of her pelvis were lost to the accident. The leg was actually dead, on arrival and we had to amputate her.”

For Maryam to live a normal life, the orthopedic expert said she needs a plastic surgery that would reassemble her private part in order to giver her some psychological boost and an artificial limb. The doctor said: “She needs plastic surgery, a repair to reconstruct something that will resemble a female genital organ to give her some psychological boost. We need to have a way for her to move around, probably an artificial limb and we all know getting this is very expensive. We need to be counselling her all the time and we all know that at her age she needs to be bubbling and all that and for her to be confined to a spot is a terrible thing.”
The girl needs help to be flown abroad for the construction of the external genital organ and mobility and necessary rehabilitation, because the hospital lacks the necessary facilities to do plastic surgery on her.

Fortunately, however, the expert added that Maryam’s womb was still intact and gave assurance that she could conceive if the plastic surgery to reconstruct her external organ is carried out. He also called on corporate organizations and religious bodies, governments and other Nigerians to assist her aid by raising funds for her.

The doctor who canvassed an effective national health insurance scheme disclosed that Maryam would need about N10million to carry out multiple surgeries on her:
“This is what we are saying about national health insurance, so that patients who are from poor background will have the hope of receiving treatment at low cost.
“The health insurance scheme only covered the organized sector. There is the need to increase the coverage of the scheme to cover the cobblers, mechanics, okada riders and taxi drivers and other non-organized sectors. Government should not stop at the organized sector alone.
“We need to cover more and government should do more by ensuring that welfare scheme is introduced to make people more comfortable and reduce stress and desperation on the part of the people.”

Posted: at 2-03-2011 12:59 PM (13 years ago) | Gistmaniac

How far man! long time

Posted: at 2-03-2011 01:32 PM (13 years ago) | Gistmaniac