Emergency Medicine Residents at Korle-Bu Teaching Hospital have confirmed that a viral video showing patients being treated on the floor of the hospital’s Accident and Emergency (A&E) Centre is genuine and reflects the reality on the ground.

In a statement issued on March 23, the residents said the footage accurately captures the conditions under which care is being delivered, contrary to claims that it was misleading or fabricated.

“The video footage is authentic. When the surge in patients exhausted all available beds, chairs were provided. When those chairs were also exhausted, patients had no option but to receive care on the floor. This sequence was witnessed by every member of our clinical team,” the statement said.

They rejected suggestions that the footage was manipulated, stating that describing it as “AI-generated” or media slander is “factually inaccurate and an affront to both patients and staff.”

The residents also addressed recent efforts to ease pressure at the facility, including the provision of 200 additional beds. While acknowledging the move, they said it does not resolve the crisis.

“Beds without functional oxygen points, airway equipment, monitoring tools, adequate floor space, and sufficient nursing and physician staffing ratios do not improve care. They congest an already overwhelmed space,” they said, adding that “a comprehensive, resourced solution is required, not headline figures.”

They further explained that the situation at Korle-Bu reflects deeper problems within the national healthcare system.

The residents pointed to several key issues, including dysfunctional referral pathways, where patients are sent to tertiary hospitals because lower-level facilities cannot manage them; absent pre-hospital coordination, which means critically ill patients arrive without prior notice or basic care; and the lack of a national bed-tracking system, making it difficult to manage patient distribution across facilities.

According to the residents, these systemic gaps continue to drive overcrowding at the hospital’s emergency centre. They said that the solution lies not in adding more beds to already congested spaces, but in strengthening the entire healthcare system.

They called on hospital management and the Ministry of Health to move beyond public relations responses and focus on lasting reforms.

“The evidence is real. The crisis is real. And the response must be equally real,” the statement said.