Dr Darius Osei, a former Chief Executive Officer of the University of Ghana Medical Centre (UGMC), has urged country to abandon its entrenched “pay-before-service” practice in emergency wards, warning that the system is costing lives.

Speaking in an interview on Joy News on April 2, 2026, Dr Osei described the demand for upfront payments from trauma victims as “a death sentence,” arguing that the country’s emergency care protocols must be radically redefined to put patients before paperwork.

During his tenure at UGMC, Dr Osei introduced a policy that barred staff from collecting money within the first 24 hours of a patient’s arrival.

He explained that emergency patients were required to be attended to within 10 minutes, with pharmacy, laboratory and radiology services strategically placed inside the emergency unit to eliminate delays caused by moving across hospital departments.

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“There was a policy that no money should be collected from any patient within 24 hours. Patients must be attended to within 10 minutes.

“…It is so cumbersome going around with documentation, getting payments done and so forth. Nobody carries 20,000 or 10,000 in their pocket... and they go pay this, pay that, pay that. By the time they finish, the patient is dead, “myjoyonline.com quoted him to have said.

Beyond billing, Dr Osei highlighted what he called a “technical vacuum” in Ghana’s districts. He noted that while the Ghana College of Physicians and Surgeons continues to train specialists, many remain concentrated in Accra because regional hospitals lack basic equipment such as CT scans.

“I believe that if for nothing at all, each district hospital should have a CT scan,” he urged.

Dr Osei’s proposals including a “Care First, Pay Later” legal framework and mandatory diagnostic infrastructure in district hospitals come amid growing debate over Ghana’s “No-Bed” and “No-Money” crises.

AM

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