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Asking for an ambulance , ends up in police station but after 3 days in intensive care. A story of lack of health access
The main respondent is a man from Afghanistan, aged between 22-30. He was living outside of the camps, in the forest around Sid, Serbia. The respondent had been feeling weak for several days, and was in contact with NNK activists. On the 19th November, 2024, we (NNK activists) observed a drastic deterioration of his health situation, and approached the respondent. His skin was yellowish, and he described his other symptoms such as constant dizziness, chest pain and headache.
The respondent agreed to go to the hospital, but reported that he was very afraid to go to the hospital, so we arranged a private doctor and reserved an appointment in a private clinic in Sid. Together we were walking slowly to the street, we needed to take several breaks because he was so weak and as we reached the road he collapsed. At that point we did not have an other choice then to call an Ambulance and to go directly to the hospital. We called an Ambulance. On the emergency line they struggled several minutes to find an English speaking person. The ambulance came quickly but as soon they saw their patient is a person on the move, they were acting harshly, asking our team about ID documents, which he not had. They didn’t do a proper assessment, for example they did not take all his vitals. As they wanted him to stand up to get him into the ambulance they didn’t help him to stand up and even tried to prevent our team to help him standing up, although he was to weak to do it alone.
As we were arriving at the Sid hospital behind them, he was already being “treated“ in the emergency room. Our team member was send out of the room, so he was all alone, and as far we could hear they only spoke Serbski to him, which he did not understand. We already feared that he is not treated right and got the proof later: just 10 minutes after arriving they told us that everything is good with him. They just gave a Saline Infusion and a medication which was not related to his symptoms. Even with us demanding to get answers about the specific symptoms, they were denying that he is ill. Instead of it they were trying to charge us for the “treatment” they give to him.
Parallel to that the police arrived and since the hospital released him they took him into custody. He was then taken to Preševo camp.
In Preševo camp, the doctor firstly just gave him painkillers, but after the person on the move spoke with a translator present in the camp and explaining how he feels the doctor decided to send him to hospital.
First he was sent to Vranje hospital, but since they couldn’t do all the necessary analisies he was transfered to Niš KC, 2 hours driving from Presevo Camp.
For a day he was at the intensive care then transfered to regular gastrology room. After all the long and complicated journey he finally received the medical care he needed. The hospital wanted to do analyses to find out if there is an internal bleeding and where it comes from. He had a visit from a Pashtu translator(who is a doctor as well) but after being several days there he refused to stay any longer and hospital required a translator to come back so he can sign his realise. Preševo camp authorities then came to pick him up.
overview
1 people ,
from Afghanistan,
aged between 22-30.