• He said his family was devastated that a 3-year-old could contract the virus
• He shared the details on The Lowdown on GhanaWeb TV
A two-time survivor of the novel Coronavirus has bemoaned the worrying system that led to his positive result being exchanged with his three-year-old son's.
According to the survivor, whose identity has been concealed for fears of stigmatization, after his entire family took the test when his wife, a frontline worker, contracted the virus, they went back home to wait for their results to be shared with them.
He explained to Nii Akwei Ismail Akwei, host of The Lowdown on GhanaWeb TV, that when the call eventually came, they were told that his son had rather tested positive for the virus. This completely shattered them, he said.
He said it happened when he first tested positive for the virus.
“In the first instance, with support from the hospital, it was good as they kept calling but the first thing that broke all of us our hearts was breaking the news to us. I think the lady who called, mistakenly used my name for my son and said ‘this one has tested positive.’ I mean, a three-year-old boy, going to test positive was more serious to see than the father has tested positive,” he said.
Unsettled by the news, he described how they made a number of frantic calls to persons they hoped could help until another call came from the hospital.
“So we became worried, started calling every specialist that we knew in church, that we knew they are up there and who could help us. Then about a couple of hours later, she called and said, no, we got the information wrong; it’s rather the father who has tested positive but the son didn’t test positive,” he said.
Asked by the host what kind of explanations were given for such a mix-up, he said, “Well, she just said it was miscommunication and said sorry for that.”
