Government commits to save Mchinji conjoined twins
Minister of Health Khumbize Kandodo Chiponda says the government is committed to saving lives of the conjoined babies born to Ethel Zimba and Robert Kwenda of Mchinji last June.
The children were born in June 2022 at Kamuzu Central Hospital in Lilongwe where medical experts recommended that they undergo an operation to separate them after six months.
However, Kwenda, who comes from Dick Village, Traditional Authority Mavwere in Mchinji, said in an interview that the hospital referred the case to The Mercy James Centre for Paediatric Surgery and Intensive Care at Queen Elizabeth Central Hospital (Qech) in Blantyre where the babies were under observation by medical experts for a month.
He said: “We took them there in early January and we were discharged in February after the doctors assessed that they could not conduct a successful operation.
“They told us to go back on April 8, hoping that some body parts will have matured to make the separation possible.”
When contacted, the Qech chief administrator Gibson Mgwira, who is also the hospital’s spokesperson, said it was too early for the hospital to make its position public as it is still assessing the children’s condition.
In a separate interview, Chiponda said the children were being assessed on a monthly basis and that the government is ready to fly them abroad for further treatment based on recommendations of the local medical specialists.
Meanwhile, parents of the children have complained about stigma and discrimination they are facing following the birth of the conjoined babies.
The parents said that while some community members sympathise with the condition of the babies, others associate the babies’ condition to supernatural developments.
