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Monday, April 29, 2002 - Web posted at 9:23:42 pm GMT

A WOMAN patient was found dead in a storm water drain at the Oshakati State Hospital complex on Saturday.

Helena Kaluwapa (30) is believed to have drowned, although the exact circumstances of her death remain a mystery.

Her naked body was found in the water channel on Saturday morning by her aunt Leoni Aron (32), who is also a patient at the hospital.

The Police were reluctant to comment yesterday and said they were still investigating Kaluwapa's death.

However, the death has raised anger about the presence on the hospital grounds of open drainage channels that pose a danger to patients and visitors, and are also a breeding ground for disease and malaria-bearing mosquitoes.

Aron told The Namibian that Kaluwapa, who lived at Ombili in Windhoek with her husband, came to the North to attend the funeral of her sister.

"Just after the funeral Kaluwapa became sick and we took her to the Oshakati State Hospital where she was admitted," Aron said.

Her mother had been checking on her until Thursday when she returned to her home village to do Kaluwapa's laundry.

However, Kaluwapa was discharged from hospital on Friday, when her mother was not there.

Aron said she was told by other patients in the same ward as her niece that Kaluwapa had decided to leave the hospital of her own accord when she realised no relatives were there to accompany her.

She told The Namibian that Kaluwapa went out through the window of Ward 8 "and ran away into the darkness".

"I think she fell in the drain channel when she was running," Aron said.

However, it is not clear why Kaluwapa left through the window or why she was not wearing her hospital clothes when she was found.

Her aunt and nursing staff said there was no sign that she was mentally disturbed. On Saturday morning, Kaluwapa's mother, Leoni Johannes, went to check on her, but found her bed empty.

Meme Johannes and Aron, along with several nurses and other staff, started to search for Kaluwapa.

It was Aron who made the horrifying discovery of the body of her niece lying in the storm water drain.

"I just looked in one of the drains and I saw then body of a person in there and when checking, I realised that it was Kaluwapa, my niece," Aron told The Namibian.

The Police were then called to remove the body. When The Namibian arrived at the scene on Saturday morning, members of the public and hospital staff were surrounding the drainage channel as the Police pulled the body out.

Oshakati residents have complained on numerous occasions that the water channels should have been covered.

"These [open drains] cause danger to everyone walking around the Oshakati State Hospital and will cause other incidents of this kind if the hospital is not going to cover them," Skinny Hilundwa, a community leader in Oshakati, said.

Approached for comment, Oshakati State Hospital Superintendent Dr Korbinian Vizcaya Amutenya said he would only be able to speak about the incident today.

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