County rescues ailing girl confined in shanty

Vihiga Governor Moses Akaranga (second left) leads a team from the county in rescuing an eight-year-old girl from her family's rented house in Majengo on December 5, 2016. Her mother said she had turned to traditional herbs and prayers after tests in hospitals failed to detect any disease. PHOTO | DERICK LUVEGA | NATION MEDIA GROUP

What you need to know:

  • Deputy Medical Superintendent, Dr Victor Tsimbulu, told Nation.co.ke that frantic efforts were being made to refer the critically ill girl to a private facility for specialised medical attention.
  • The single mother of three said it is at this time that she opted to keep the child in the house and resorted to use of traditional herbs and prayers but they did not work.

Two women, a mother and her daughter, were on Monday taken into custody at the Vihiga police station before they were later released over child negligence.

The two, Janet Ajema, 36, and her elderly mother, Jelda Muhonja, were accused of hiding eight-year-old Hildah Andisi, who is suffering from an unknown ailment, in a rented shanty in Majengo, Vihiga County, and denying the minor access to treatment.

At the same time, Governor Moses Akaranga has ordered health officers at Vihiga County Referral Hospital in Mbale to attend to the girl, whose head, stomach and left thigh are swollen.

Her left eye, too, has protruded, rendering her partially blind.

However, because all health workers had joined their colleagues in the nationwide strike, the girl was not being attended to.

Deputy Medical Superintendent Victor Tsimbulu told Nation.co.ke that frantic efforts were being made to refer the critically ill girl to a private facility for specialised medical attention.

"She will be referred to either Kijabe Mission Hospital or Tenwek in Bomet because she will not be attended to due to the strike,” he said,

“This is a suspected case of cancer that begun with a small swelling on the left leg and spread all over her body, leading to the swelling," he added.

The medic took issue with the mother for keeping the child in the house even as the child's condition deteriorated.

He said: "The girl was here [at the hospital] in January and we advised the mother to take her for a CT scan. This is the highest level of negligence on the side of the mother that I have ever seen."

Dr Tsimbulu said the county government had offered to cater for her medical bill.

Before, the arrest of the two, the girl's mother said her efforts to have the child treated were futile after doctors in Vihiga and Kisumu told her no disease was detected following numerous tests.

"Her condition, that has since gone bad, started as a boil in 2015," she said.

While displaying medical reports, she added: "The condition became worse in July this year. I took her to our hospital in Mbale and doctors said all the tests did not reveal any disease."

The single mother of three said it was at this time that she opted to keep the child in the house and resorted to using traditional herbs and prayers but they did not work.

The ailing child is a Standard Two pupil at Mavui Primary School. Her condition was made public by Ikumba Sub-Location Assistant Chief Kennedy Agama, who notified area MCA Abdallah Chogo, leading to the arrest of the two.

But the mother said she is poor and that her husband had deserted her over the girl's health.

Governor Akaranga, who called for the arrest of the two, complained that the ailing girl had been denied access to treatment and had been confined to her bed by her parents.

The county chief visited the family at the rented home, where he led the rescue mission and offered to pay all hospital bills with county government funds.