Liberia has lost a daughter, a mother, a voice—silenced not by fate, but by a shameful and avoidable collapse in medical oversight. The death of 28-year-old Jamesetta Kugmeh is indeed a tragedy. It is an indictment of a health regulatory system that has grown complacent, deaf to the cries of its people, and disturbingly loyal to silence over justice.
Jamesetta did not go quietly. She documented her pain. She named names. She tagged the very institutions mandated to protect her. She pled, “Please look into my case. I am dying slowly.” But those charged with accountability—the Liberia Medical and Dental Council (LMDC), the Ministry of Health, and the Liberian Board of Nursing & Midwifery—offered her no answers, no action, not even the dignity of acknowledgment. And now she is dead.
Where was the LMDC when this young woman sounded the alarm about a botched C-section at ELWA Hospital that she believed led to kidney failure, a collapsed urethra, internal burns, and ultimately the loss of her womb and her life? Where were the investigators when she begged for help from her hospital bed, undergoing dialysis in a foreign country, seeking not just medical healing but the truth?
The silence from the LMDC is criminal in its cowardice. On the very day of Jamesetta’s death—May 20, 2025—The Liberian Investigator submitted a formal inquiry. We asked whether the LMDC had begun an investigation, requested medical records, or contacted her while she was in Ghana for treatment. We received nothing. Not even a confirmation of receipt. That silence is now a stain on the conscience of our health authorities.
Family sources, speaking under condition of anonymity, claimed no investigation was launched because the patient had traveled abroad. If this is the policy guiding our nation’s primary medical regulator, it is not only misguided—it is deadly. Must a patient be within Liberian borders to have her suffering acknowledged? Are cross-border treatments now a loophole for avoiding accountability?
Jamesetta Kugmeh died under circumstances so suspicious that they demanded immediate intervention. From the moment she posted her first plea on social media—detailing complications from a surgery she described as forced, conducted by unfamiliar doctors, and followed by inexplicable medical deterioration—the LMDC should have acted. So should the Ministry of Health. But instead, they watched.
Even ELWA Hospital, which once claimed in March to be “fully cooperating” with health authorities, has gone mute. What became of its internal review? Was the LMDC ever provided the findings? Did the Ministry of Health so much as request a status update? If they did, the public deserves to know.
Instead, we are expected to accept a young woman’s death as just another sad case. But it is not. It is a case study in regulatory failure. It is a warning to every pregnant mother, every patient, every Liberian: if something goes wrong at the hands of a medical provider, you may scream, you may cry, you may die—and no one may be held accountable.
The Liberian Investigator demands answers. We demand action. We demand accountability.
We call on the House of Representatives’ Committee on Health to immediately summon the leadership of the LMDC and the Ministry of Health to explain their failure to act.
We call for the immediate suspension of any medical practitioners involved in Jamesetta’s surgery pending a full, independent investigation.
We call for the Ministry of Justice to open a criminal inquiry into whether gross negligence or medical malpractice played a role in Jamesetta’s death.
We also echo Jamesetta’s dying wish: conduct an autopsy. Verify the timeline. Scrutinize the records from both Liberia and Ghana. Expose the truth that she believed was being covered up.
This is not just about one woman. It is about the integrity of Liberia’s entire health system. It is about whether we are willing to protect lives—or merely bury them when the questions get hard.
Jamesetta Kugmeh may be gone, but her voice will not be silenced.
We will not let them get away with it.
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