A toddler died in one of Nigeria’s most prestigious private hospitals, the doctors involved were suspended by the regulator, and yet the institution at the centre of the tragedy is fighting to stop the public inquiry that could reveal exactly what happened.
Development Diaries reports that 21-month-old Nkanu, son of prominent writer Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, died at Euracare Multi-Specialist Hospital in Lagos nearly six months ago, but the circumstances surrounding his death have become the centre of a wider debate about medical accountability and patient safety.
Nkanu’s mother brought the case into public view on 13 June 13, when she published a letter addressed to the chairman of Euracare’s board, alleging that the hospital’s Medical Director, Dr Tosin Majekodunmi, visited the family shortly after Nkanu’s death and acknowledged that the anaesthesiologist, Dr Titus Ogundare, had administered excessive propofol during the procedure.
She also alleged failures in oxygen monitoring, delays in emergency response, and other clinical lapses that she said were verbally admitted by senior hospital officials.
This development has exposed a healthcare system in which accountability often depends less on what happened and more on who has the resources, influence, and stamina to keep asking questions.
The search for truth
One of the most significant developments in the case was Euracare’s initial request for a coroner’s inquest. In ordinary circumstances, that should have been the beginning of an independent process designed to establish the facts surrounding a death.
Under Lagos State law, deaths occurring under unusual or unexplained circumstances in medical facilities can be subjected to such public inquiries, with the proceedings intended to provide clarity, not punishment.
That is why the current legal battle has drawn intense public scrutiny. Euracare originally asked for a coroner’s inquest into Nkanu’s death, but the hospital is now seeking a court order to stop that inquiry from going ahead. The move has effectively put the fact-finding process on hold, with the Coroner’s Court adjourned until October 2026 pending a decision on Euracare’s application.
Beyond one family
The most troubling part of this case may be what happened after Nkanu died. Chimamanda Adichie has the visibility, legal support, and public platform that most Nigerian families do not have. If obtaining answers and accountability has been this difficult for her, it raises concerns about what happens to families without those advantages.
Every year, patients die in private hospitals under circumstances that families do not fully understand, with some deaths resulting from unavoidable medical complications. Others may involve negligence, poor systems, inadequate supervision, or preventable errors.
Determining which category a death belongs to should not depend on whether a grieving family can afford lawyers or command public attention. But that is often how the system functions.
Nigeria’s rapidly growing private healthcare sector operates without a comprehensive national framework requiring hospitals to publicly report adverse events, medical errors, or procedure-related deaths. There is no searchable database allowing patients to determine whether a facility has a history of preventable incidents.
There is also no mandatory public disclosure system showing how often serious complications occur or how institutions respond when they do.
In practice, many incidents remain known only to hospital administrators, affected families, and occasionally regulators.
The missing records
In countries that have invested heavily in patient safety systems, hospitals are often required to report serious adverse events, with deaths following procedures, medication errors, anaesthesia complications, and major clinical mistakes documented, reviewed, and analysed.
The purpose is to identify patterns before they become tragedies, and a hospital where multiple patients experience similar complications attracts regulatory scrutiny, while a practitioner repeatedly linked to adverse outcomes may face restrictions.
Nigeria lacks such a framework at national scale.
What exists instead is a largely reactive system of regulators that often become involved only after complaints are filed, investigations frequently begin after public pressure emerges, and accountability mechanisms tend to activate after damage has already occurred.
In other words, the system often behaves like a fire brigade that waits for a building to collapse before checking whether faulty wiring exists.
Who should be answering questions?
The Federal Ministry of Health bears responsibility for the absence of a nationwide adverse-event reporting framework. As private healthcare expands across Nigeria, regulation has not evolved at the same pace.
As for the Medical and Dental Council of Nigeria, it deserves credit for suspending practitioners connected to the case. However, the fact that such action occurred only after significant public attention has led many to ask whether similar cases involving less prominent families receive the same urgency.
The National Health Insurance Authority (NHIA) also faces scrutiny, as private hospitals that benefit from public healthcare financing arrangements are not currently required to maintain publicly accessible records of adverse events as a condition of accreditation.
The National Assembly, meanwhile, has overseen years of private healthcare growth without establishing the reporting and transparency systems that have become standard in many healthcare jurisdictions.
Each of these gaps contributes to a system where accountability often arrives late, if it arrives at all.
A patient’s right
Patients have a right to safe medical care, with families having a right to know what happened when a loved one dies under medical supervision, while citizens have a right to expect that healthcare institutions will be transparent about serious failures.
Those rights become difficult to exercise when information remains hidden, investigations are delayed, and accountability depends largely on persistence rather than institutional design.
A family should not need a bestselling author, a national platform, and months of public advocacy simply to learn the circumstances surrounding a child’s death.
The silent majority
Women often bear the heaviest burden when medical systems fail, with mothers navigating childbirth complications, neonatal emergencies, or paediatric crises frequently becoming the primary advocates for affected children while simultaneously coping with grief and financial strain.
Low-income families face even greater obstacles. Unlike prominent public figures, they often lack access to legal representation, media attention, or regulatory influence. Many simply accept explanations they do not fully understand because challenging them requires resources they do not possess.
Patients living with disabilities face additional vulnerabilities, particularly during procedures involving sedation, anaesthesia, or intensive medical monitoring.
The absence of data creates another form of invisibility.
A system built for delay
Families seeking answers move from hospital administrators to regulators, from regulators to lawyers, from lawyers to courts, and from courts to lengthy procedural battles. At every stage, the process becomes more expensive, more technical, and more exhausting.
That reality helps explain why Nkanu’s case is about a healthcare accountability system that appears structured in ways that make persistence a prerequisite for truth.
And if one of Nigeria’s most prominent families can spend months pursuing accountability after a toddler’s death, what happens to families whose names nobody recognises?
