Jensen La Vende

A 22-year-old man was stabbed in the arm by his ex-lover at the Port-of-Spain Gen­er­al Hos­pi­tal yes­ter­day.

Ac­cord­ing to a me­dia re­lease from the North West Re­gion­al Health Au­thor­i­ty, the in­ci­dent took place at 11.42 am in the carpark of the Bio­med­ical, En­gi­neer­ing and Cen­tral Stores (BE­CO) de­part­ment.

Af­ter the stab­bing, the woman was ar­rest­ed and hand­ed over to po­lice, while the man was tak­en to the Ac­ci­dent and Emer­gency De­part­ment for med­ical treat­ment.

The re­lease as­sured that the safe­ty of both staff and vis­i­tors to the hos­pi­tal was of para­mount im­por­tance, with the NWRHA “reaf­firm­ing its com­mit­ment to up­hold­ing the high­est stan­dards of work­place safe­ty.”

The NWRHA said it was tak­ing the mat­ter se­ri­ous­ly.

When Guardian Me­dia vis­it­ed the hos­pi­tal, work­ers were seen hud­dled dis­cussing the in­ci­dent while se­cu­ri­ty, in­clud­ing an armed of­fi­cer, was seen pa­trolling the Ac­ci­dent and Emer­gency area.

This is the sec­ond time the NWRHA has had to is­sue a me­dia re­lease on the safe­ty of staff and vis­i­tors at the hos­pi­tal.

In June last year, Kevin King was fol­lowed from Gon­za­les and killed at the Port-of-Spain Gen­er­al Hos­pi­tal.

King and his three friends, Jay­den Reyes, Ab­dul Williams, and Jonathan Ar­joon, were part of a group shot at while lim­ing along Lange Street, Gon­za­les. Af­ter King was tak­en to the hos­pi­tal, gun­men at­tacked him again on the com­pound.

The mur­ders prompt­ed the NWRHA to in­stall bar­ri­ers to pre­vent easy ac­cess to the Ac­ci­dent and Emer­gency De­part­ment, along with oth­er se­cu­ri­ty mea­sures.

Months lat­er, St James Med­ical Com­plex work­er Ja­maal Watts was killed while cut­ting grass. This too forced the NWRHA to in­crease its se­cu­ri­ty at the fa­cil­i­ty.