Three patients lost their lives at Aminu Kano Teaching Hospital last week after Kano Electricity Distribution Company (KEDCO) cut the hospital’s power supply over a reported ₦949.88 million debt.

 Ventilators went off, and three of four patients on life support didn’t survive the blackout.

The tragedy raises hard questions: in a country where power outages are part of daily life, how long must Nigerians continue paying with their lives for systemic failures? 

Can the value of three human lives ever be weighed against a hospital’s unpaid electricity bills? 

And does debt justify decisions that put patients at risk in a facility that exists to save lives?

KEDCO has since reconnected the hospital after intervention from the police and hospital authorities. 

But the damage is done. Families are grieving. Trust is broken. And the debate deepens over how Nigeria’s fragile power system continues to hold citizens hostage.

Hospitals are not ordinary consumers. They are lifelines.

 Until leaders confront this reality and prioritize health facilities above bureaucracy and profit margins, the same painful question will echo: how many more lives must be lost before Nigeria secures reliable, humane electricity?