I was a victim of COVID 19 , a survival through the grace of Allah. I know the tremendous pains, the excruciating vice grip on the lungs, the racking throttling of the throat, the persistent, savaging cough, the gasping heavy breath for life.

I write this as a tribute to a fellow Prince of Lagos and an Ọmọ Eko Pataki, Prince Muis Adediran Shodipe-Dosunmu, who just passed on; another victim of the COVID scourge.

Muis death was avoidable. He died in a terrible atmosphere at IDH in Yaba where the doctors were ill -motivated, without salary, without the least incentive to carry out their duties.

The doctors and nurses are often ill-equipped to tackle the challenges of COVID. They subjected Muis to various cocktails of drugs ranging from disparate antibiotics to Omeprazole which eventually impaired his kidneys. Every day his elder brother, Prince Uthman Shodipe-Dosunmu, was given different prescriptions. For thirteen days of living hell, Uthman procurred a vast array of medications at 68 Army Reference Hospital as if his younger brother was being reduced to a guinea pig experimentation until life ebbed out of him inside an ambulance with a single nurse who was not even equipped with a mere  syringe. He died as he was rushed for dialysis on the grounds of St Nicholas in Maryland.

It is quite shameful that a state that generates over 50 billion naira every month cannot adequately protect her citizens and properly equip her hospitals against the scourge of COVID.

Needless deaths are recorded everyday because Lagos state oxygen plants are not adequately supplied. Patients die when the central oxygen supply abruptly ceases.  Patients die when power supply suddenly goes off.  Patients die when the dialysis machine at the IDH are reduced to object of politicization.

I wonder why the Lagos State government cannot make the vaccine available on its own accord instead of waiting for Federal Government to supply it from its own stocks.

Culturally, people live in extended family contact.  It will be difficult to treat COVID-19 cases at homes.

Muis death was avoidable. He died in a terrible atmosphere at IDH in Yaba where the doctors were ill -motivated, without salary, without the least incentive to carry out their duties.

What are plans of the state for treating COVID-19 in the schools, in the markets and other public places ?

Apart from IDH Yaba equipped by donors (Bill Gates etc), where else would victims of COVID-19 report for treatment. Victims of COVID-19 are dying in hundreds  without state putting in any rectifying remedy. The Ọmọ Eko Pataki is now urging the Federal Government to probe the spate of unreported deaths at the IDH in Yaba.

Many patients cannot afford the cost of treatment which often runs  into millions. This is a hard chew for those who are struggling with poverty and other challenges of existence.

Wouldn’t it be a good idea if our elected Representatives could use their Constituency projects funds to set temporary IDHs in their senatorial districts? Many lives would be saved!

The state has enough financial muscle to take this extra mileage to save lives. Alpha Beta, ICC, JB, Aliko Dangote etc can give support in this regard to save people’s lives. Who knows who the next victims of Covid 19 Delta variant would be?

We at Ọmọ Eko Pataki are now urging the Lagos State government to urgently leave up to her responsibilities by immediately infusing funds to a more effective healthcare programme that will upgrade our hospitals, motivate the health workers and stop the avoidable deaths in our state.  The present situation is really disheartening. Muis would have been saved if the state had prioritised her responsibilities instead of the seeming indifference and  ineptitude at the highest level which has now tragically percolated down the line.

*Major General Tajudeen Olanrewaju (rtd) is trustee of Ọmọ Eko Pataki

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Life is unfair. The heavens are not fathomable. We are all captives of the cruel whims of fate.

My younger brother is gone. Prince Muis Adediran Shodipe-Dosunmu has transited to the realm beyond the human ken.

There were five of us who sprung from the womb of Alhaja Taibat Abiola Aduki Dosunmu, the daughter of Monsuru Salawu – Ado Dosunmu. Now I am the solitary orphan, saddled with an unbearable burden.

We had taken Muis to IDH at Yaba, having showed symptoms of Covid 19 infection.  Of his own strength, he walked across the four steep steps that led to Ward C on July 15th.

We secured a room as we rallied the staff through “nudging”.  Oxygen tanks were secured, drips and several prescribed antibiotics were procured at the 68th Army Reference hospital, about 100 meters away from the Mainland Hospital which is now called IDH.

As the State Secretary, he was the great unifier, the solemn man of peace, appealing to all sides of the divide even when the party was fraught with feud.

His condition improved in the first few days as he requested for Lucozade, fruits and other energy strengthening boosters like powdered Complan. All these he sipped through the straw.

He chatted with inspired contentment. Even as he gasped as power fluctuated and the oxygen supply dropped, he fought hard, praying with hoary, wispy voice, chorusing a faint insistent hallelujah, grappling with that brutal virus that was strangulating his lungs.

Even then, amid the pain, amid the lacerating lash of fate, you could still gleen some redeeming progression, the resolved fighting spirit, the unyielding insistence to void the dark inflictions of life.

About the 9th day when we got there,  the doctors introduced Omeprazole injection which was supposed to heal the esophagus and remove acids from the stomach.

That was a deadly turn. The negative effect of Omeprazole is the crippling destruction of the kidney.  It was one of his children who is a pharmacist that noticed this injurious implication and told the doctors to halt the infusion of the drug immediately.

But, alas! The damage had been done. His kidney had been impaired. We were directed to do dialysis, to which we promptly agreed.

Our nightmare at IDH sprung immediately. One doctor Ojuroye, the resident nephrologist who shuttles between Gbagada and Mainland kept dribbling everyone. I called everyone I knew in the upper echelon of Lagos government and their party. From Permanent Secretary to Commissioner, from party big wig to family friends, none could bring Dr Ojuroye to my brother’s aid.

For eight hours, he refused to pick his call. He kept dodging, equivocating, dribbling one as life ebbed and drained from my brother’s body.

One minute Doctor Ojuroye would say the dialysis machine was working and that he was on his way with his team. Another minute, he would call and say the machine had been dismantled and that it would take 10 days to fix it.

The Managing Director of the Mainland Hospital, one Dr. Abimbola Adebowale, finally led a team of his technicians  to the machine on 27th of July and confirmed that the machine was effective and working without defect.

Still, Dr Ojuroye refused to come. After three days of deliberate, vile and evil negligence, I was advised to take my brother to St Nicholas Hospital at Maryland. As my brother was rolled to the premises in the early morn of Wednesday, it was too late.

He was worn, drained, murdered by insentient men and a corrupt and compromised system that knew no God.  Dr Ojuroye, through his indifference and unfathomable malignity contributed to my brother’s death.

Those who gave Muis Omeprazole equally stand guilty of manslaughter. All these are actionable.

Prince Muis Adediran Shodipe- Dosunmu was a wonderful loving soul imbued with the natural instinct of gregarious largeness.

Like it was said of the Emancipator, now Muis belongs to the ages, reposes in eternal glory in the bosom of the great Nazarene.

He was easily affable, warm, accommodating, glowing with wide embrace.

Where I could be aloof and distant, Muis was warm, embracing everyone with genuine kindness.

He was the archetypal politician who slaved selflessly for the People’s Democratic Party with staunch, steadfast vision. As the State Secretary, he was the great unifier, the solemn man of peace, appealing to all sides of the divide even when the party was fraught with feud.

Muis was my younger brother. But he was more. He was my best friend who I trusted whole-heartily. He harbored no malice. He was unknown to grievances. He was woven with almost paradisal grace; charming, trusting, exuding in the calm majesty of a true  Lagos prince; confident, assertive without intrusive energy; knowledgeable, multi-talented in all spheres.

He was at once an artist and a sculptor, a scholar, business man and party scribe.

Muis had fulfilled his course.  His journey is made. His mission has reached a defining coda.  Like it was said of the Emancipator, now Muis belongs to the ages, reposes in eternal glory in the bosom of the great Nazarene.

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