A Ghanaian man living in Italy has alleged that one of his kidneys was removed while he was receiving treatment at a hospital after travelling from Libya to Italy.

The man, who is currently homeless in Monza, a neighbourhood in Milan, said he travelled to Italy in 2016 after spending four years in Libya.

He said he had been a footballer in Ghana and travelled to Italy with a group of footballers, hoping to secure a place with a team.

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“I left Ghana in 2013 and lived in Libya for four years. I came to Italy in 2016, and before I came, I used to be a footballer in Ghana. I arrived on August 1, 2016, as part of a group of footballers. I was hoping that, due to my football career, they could help me secure a team if I performed well, so I decided to partake in a football game that was organised in November that year,” he said.

He said he lost consciousness during the game, only to wake up in the hospital, where he was informed that he had badly injured his leg.

According to him, doctors told him they would operate on the leg instead of amputating it and assured him that he could return to football three months after the operation.

“During the match, I lost consciousness only to wake up in the hospital. I then realised that I had badly injured my leg, which I couldn’t understand how it could have happened, so I asked the doctor for answers, and they told me it was due to the football. They told me they would operate on my leg instead of amputating it and that I could even go ahead and play football after three months, once the operation was done,” he narrated.

He said he was asked to sign some documents before the operation but did not understand the language at the time.

He also claimed that he was injected several times without knowing what the injections were for.

“Before the surgical operation, they brought me some documents to sign, and because I didn’t understand their language at the time, I ended up signing. I was injected several times, which I didn’t understand. I was later discharged after I recovered and decided to get a job,” he said.

After returning to work, the man said he began feeling unusually weak and dizzy, and added that he reported his condition to the people he was staying with at the football camp.

“It was during the course of the job that I suspected that the operation wasn’t done properly because I could feel that my body had become badly weakened. I was still at the football camp at the time, so I told them about the weakness and how I felt dizzy all the time,” he said.

He said he later collapsed while going to work, forcing the owner of the job to call an ambulance, and was taken back to the same hospital where he had undergone the operation.

The man said someone approached him at the hospital the following morning and asked about his condition and whether he had family in Italy.

He told the person that he had no family in the country and had entered Italy illegally, and was advised by the unknown man to be careful, which made him leave the hospital.

“The following day at dawn, someone approached me on the hospital bed and asked me why I was there. I told him about the operation, and the person asked me if I had family in Italy.

“I told him I didn’t and came here illegally. The person then told me that if I’m not careful, I might not live there alive, so I heeded his words and left. I then realised what they had done to me, and they failed to give me a copy of the documents I signed,” he added.

He said he subsequently began demanding answers from his caretakers at the football camp.

According to him, they responded by calling the police and claiming that he was mentally ill.

He then alleged that his kidney had been removed during the treatment.

“I started demanding answers from my caretakers at the camp, and when they noticed I had caught on to their deeds, they called the police on me, telling them I was mentally ill… They took my kidney,” he alleged.

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The man said another person who was taken to the hospital with him had previously told him that his kidney had been removed.

He said he did not believe the person's claim at the time, but later came to believe that the same thing had happened to him after the person died.

“I and another guy were taken to the hospital and placed in the same ward, but he died. Before his death, he told me his kidney had been taken, and I didn’t believe him until it happened to me,” he said.

Watch his interview below:



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