Another Belizean has died, and once again, the adequacy of Belize’s medical system has come into question.
This time, the witnesses to Belize’s inadequate medical system were not only Belizeans, but five American nurses on vacation. In their professional capacity, they administered to a Belizean who was a victim of a traffic accident on the Northern Highway between Miles 40 and 41, and they gave a tragic account of what happened.
A Geo Tracker heading to Orange Walk Town collided with a bus traveling in the opposite direction, and overturned. The MCI bus was being driven by Reynaldo Gilharry, while the Geo Tracker was being driven by Christopher Young, 25, who died as a result of the accident.
Travelling with Young was his brother, Darrel Galloway, 30, a construction engineer who suffered a broken arm and is presently recovering in the Northern Regional Hospital.
According to Deborah Young, the mother of the two accident victims, her son Christopher was studying civil engineering, and was in his final year of studies in Havana, Cuba. Christopher was home for a few weeks’ vacation before school reopens on September 3, his mother told Amandala this evening.
For the five years that he has been studying in Cuba, Christopher would visit home once a year; he had only been home since July 29.
Travelling on the Northern Highway shortly after the accident occurred around 7:15 p.m. was Rheynan Castillo and Pricilla Beet, two Belizeans who were returning from a trip to the Maya ruins of Lamanai with five professional American nurses who are visiting Belize.
The nurses are all employed at the North Oak Medical Centre in the state of Mississippi, and some of them are lecturers in nursing courses at the Southwest Mississippi Community College.
Beet said that when she got to the curve at Mile 40, she saw a lot of police vehicles with beacons flashing, and immediately she realized that there had been a traffic accident. When she looked to the left side of the highway, she saw two bodies lying there.
“Knowing that we have five nurses on board and we did not see an ambulance, I put on my hazard light and moved toward where the police officers were. I told the first policeman that I saw, that we have five nurses on board and we want to help out,” Beet said.
She further related, “Everyone was saying, ‘help them, please help them.’ Cathy, one of the head nurses where she works, just got in there and started working at him, trying to get to see the wounds. He was so distraught that he kept trying to sit up, and his left arm was like elastic, it just kept flapping back. We saw a lot of bleeding coming from him. And he was saying, ‘please help my brother, please help my brother.’
“After Cathy and the team started to help them, I saw that he was losing a lot of blood. I turned to the police officer and told him that we have to get them out of there. He said to me, ‘we already called for the ambulance.’
“I said, ‘we don’t have time for the ambulance; we got to get these people out of here.’ And this other guy on the ground [Galloway] asked me, ‘Miss, is my arm broken?’ I replied, ‘yes sir, your arm is broken.’ It was like a “U” behind him. He kept saying, ‘I should have been the one driving.’ At this point, Kerry and Abby [two of the nurses] were trying to calm him down.”
According to Beet, she ran to the police mobile and told them that the young men couldn’t stay there, and her colleague Abby also tried to talk to them. But, Beet said, the officers seemed confused. She said, “One guy, he was walking around with a machine gun and I was wondering what the gun is for.”
Beet said that nurse Cathy indicated that they needed to wrap the broken arm of Galloway. She said that a man who she could not identify took his shirt off and handed it to them so that they could treat the arm.
“Wendy, another nurse,” Beet said, “just ran into the bushes and broke off a branch off a tree and used it to tie his arm.” They then asked onlookers for shoe laces so that they could tie his hand.’
“Finally,” said Beet, “We put the guy who was in the worst shape [Christopher Young] in the police mobile. They put a towel under him and just hoisted him up and the police mobile sped off.
“We were following the police mobile, because two of our nurses were on the police mobile. About two miles down the road the ambulance met the police mobile and we transported him across to the ambulance. A very Good Samaritan picked up the other brother, who was still lying on the ground, and took him to the hospital.”
According to Beet, inside the ambulance, Cathy and Jessica (two other nurses) were searching through drawers in an effort to find necessary equipment, including an IV drip and alcohol. Beet said that the nurses asked a man in the ambulance for the supplies, but he “seemed confused’ and told them that he was “just a tech.” Apparently, in Beet’s words, “there was nothing in the ambulance for the nurses to work with.”
“When they got him to the hospital, the nurses were still working with him. The mother came and when she saw him, she just screamed,” Beet said.
Beet said that they learned this morning that the young man who was in critical condition passed away.
The nurses who lent their skills are Jessica Dunn, Abby McNeil, Wendy Kelly, Kerrie Lamb and Cathy Andrews.
We understand that no one in the bus was seriously hurt.