Several persons still hospitalized
TEN-YEAR-OLD Sean Archibald, of Crane, West Coast Demerara, one of three siblings injured in the horrific Homestretch Avenue accident which claimed five lives on Monday, has been transferred from the Paediatric Ward to the Intensive Care Unit of the Georgetown Public Hospital Corporation (GPHC) after his condition deteriorated. His mother, Shirley Richards, a Kalibur security guard, yesterday told the Guyana Chronicle that her son, who suffered severe head injuries, was earlier admitted to the Paediatric Ward, but was moved to theatre for surgery. However, in the theatre, he was unable to have the planned surgical procedure, but instead the front of his head, which witnesses saw skinned back after the accident, was flushed out and drained yesterday. A date has been decided on for him to be operated on, but he is also required to have a blood transfusion before the surgery is done.

Meanwhile, his elder sister, Doreen Jamacie Archibald, was discharged from hospital yesterday and not Tuesday as the media had been advised. Responding to continued cries, medical practitioners yesterday morning removed a piece of flint from the patient’s eye and, by midday, had sent her home.

However, the beleaguered mother, who has to be in at the hospital regularly visiting her other two injured children, could spend little or no time with the discharged child. In addition, she says Jamacie, who might have also had her back hit, cannot raise her back off the bed unassisted and actions requiring movement of the trunk are severely impeded at this time. 
The patient is also crying out for pains in the neck, among other things. Her relatives are strongly of the view that she is not sufficiently well to be discharged, and are greatly perturbed. “I am surprised that a child who has gone through all that Jamacie has, could be discharged in a day or two,” a concerned relative said,

The youngest of the three – three-year-old Tattiana Smith, suffered severe injuries to the head and neck and is fitted with a brace around the neck. She is fully conscious and responding to persons around her, but her head is quite swollen and she keeps crying to go home.

In a crib next to little Tattiana is eight-year-old Terissa Benjamin-Moore, the child visiting from the United States of America, and who had arrived here on the same day of the accident. Terissa is now fully conscious, but was asleep when this newspaper visited. Relatives said she has been stabilized, but is being monitored carefully.

At the time of the accident, Renissa was in the company of her aunt, Coretta Benjamin, a Nursery School Head and her only child, Crizel Paul, who turned eight on the same day of the accident. Ironically, the three, along with another family member, Delicia Paul, were on their way to the city to buy ice-cream to celebrate Crizel’s birthday. But sadly, they never got there.

Meanwhile, 22-year-old Keisha Thorneton of Sophia remains warded at the Female Surgical Ward. Yesterday was definitely not a good day for her, but the doctors are doing everything they could. Keisha continues to endure excruciating pains, brought on by severe head injuries she sustained, the violent extraction of several of her teeth in the accident, a cut to the lower lip, among other things.

The accident, which happened around 6:30 hrs on Monday along Homestretch Avenue, was reportedly caused after a speeding minibus, BM 988 named ‘Gold Rush’, suffered a ‘blow out’ and was sent tumbling down the road, expelling passengers in all directions.
After tumbling for several rods, it ended up on its hub in the vicinity of the Customs Anti-Narcotics Unit (CANU) and Castellani swimming pool. The badly destroyed tyre was found several feet away from the bus. The driver, who was negligibly affected, was taken into police custody.   Relatives of the dead and injured, are sincerely hoping that he would be dealt with condignly and not released on a ‘few dollars’ bail.

Traffic officials have continually said that most of the accidents on the nation’s roads are caused by speeding. And whilst improved technology is being applied to determine if a driver is under the influence of alcohol, concerned citizens are now calling for a system to be introduced locally to immediately test drivers to determine whether they would have been taking drugs, such as marijuana and cocaine, either before or when driving.