Recurrent cases of theft of babies, drugs, handsets are being reported in hospitals. 

This time around patients admitted in hospitals do not only have their ailments to battle with. They also have to deal with thieves who do not only create serious problems to their recovery process but also to their future especially when it has to do with a woman who has just given birth and later discovers her new-born baby is nowhere to be found. Cases of stolen new-born babies make headline news in the media. Nowadays, patients losing their money, mobile phones, drugs and other personal belongings seem an everyday issue in various hospitals around the country especially in the capital city. This has raised so much dust and concern as to the security of patients in hospitals.  

The stress of some women being pregnant is not the nine months of gestation or the delivery process which is usually painful and considered a “life or dead” matter by some people. The pain in it is when the new-born baby is considered “missing” after delivery. After wailing for hours when the baby is bearing-down, some women have become shocked and almost mentally deranged when told the baby that almost “dried all the tears in their eyes” is nowhere to be found. Nobody seems to understand how new-born babies are stolen from hospitals but the perpetrators, it is said, have strategic plans which are hardly known to hospital security until when the act has already taken place. Such is the case of a woman at the Yaounde Gynaeco-Obstetric and Paediatric Hospital whose case of her missing baby after delivery six months ago in the hospital is currently under investigation.

Even dead bodies are no longer secured in mortuaries because they risk being stolen or body parts mutilated. Several cases of corpses stolen from mortuaries have been reported with families at daggers-drawn with mortuary attendants on the day they come to remove their corpse. It is usually more pathetic and frightening for family members when they discover that body parts of a dead family member, usually the genital parts are removed. Even those who are lying on various sick beds in hospital wards also have to tackle with those who cannot keep their hands on their belongings. Some patients have had to buy a particular packet of drug for more than five times before their treatment is over. This is because each time they buy that drug; it gets missing after the first dose of treatment. Some patients say even after putting their money or mobile phones under their pillow while sleeping, thieves still succeed in stealing them.