Anne's Voice, Our Mission: Seeking Justice Together

Justice for My Sister – Let This Loss Mean Something

My name is Isabella Mukanda Shamambo, and though I live in the United States, my heart beats Zambian. I’m a nurse. A healthcare practitioner. And now, a brokenhearted sister mourning a loss that should never have happened. I can barely carry this burden, shattered beyond measure.

My younger sister died in Zambia not because she was too sick to survive, but because of carelessness, neglect, and people who were trusted with her life but treated her like she didn’t matter. For one whole month, I tried to advocate for her. I begged for doctors to communicate. I pleaded with them to hold off on discharging her when she was clearly still sick. No one listened.

In all that time, I only managed to speak to two doctors, one who promised to send information and never did, and another who hung up on me when I asked them to reconsider discharge because she was still very sick.

They sent her home anyway, three days later. She returned to the hospital within hours, more critical than before, and was admitted to critical care for another two weeks. Both times she was discharged, she came back in worse condition.

When she was discharged the second time, it was with unstable vital signs and medications she’d never taken before. Many of the doses were dangerously high, but we were told she needed them for the next month. Two days later, she collapsed and was rushed to the hospital.

She was groaning in pain all the way and likely had a seizure as they entered the hospital, becoming unresponsive. In the ED, no one tried to help her. A staff member felt for a pulse with their finger, pushed her into the ward for those “brought in dead,” and spent the time not intervening, but writing a note for my sisters to take to the police stating she had arrived deceased, without ever attempting resuscitation. I was on the phone, begging to speak to that staff member, and she refused, I could hear her in the background. No one else would speak to me.

My sisters were then sent to the police station to get a report declaring her dead. When they returned, they waited in the lobby for what felt like forever until a doctor finally came to "certify" her death, after they had already received paperwork stating she was gone.

How does that make sense?

To make it worse, while she was hospitalized, the doctors used her as a teaching case. Students stood around her bed, taking notes, asking questions. No one asked her for permission. And when the lesson ended, so did their attention. She was left alone, like she didn’t matter.

But she did matter. She still does.

I am now filing a lawsuit. I am using every resource I have to fight. But I’m also asking for help, not just to fund the legal process, but to make this our fight, together.

Because this isn’t just about one woman. This could be your sister. Your mother. Your child. We’ve accepted this kind of treatment too long in Zambia, this coldness, this arrogance, this deadly neglect. Even hospitals that have the tools to save lives are letting people die, simply because they don’t care.

Help me make them care.

Help me turn this grief into a call for accountability. Every kwacha, every dollar, every share is a statement that this must stop. If you’ve ever felt powerless in the face of injustice, rally with me. Let this be the fight that says, once and for all: Enough.

For my sister. For yours. For all of us.

And to my friends, colleagues, and acquaintances here in the U.S. (and across the world), please help me mourn my sister by donating to and sharing this GoFundMe. Help me bring change to my country’s healthcare. Help me stamp out the quiet, deadly corruption of soul.

If you knew Anne through work, church, community efforts, or as a friend; if you are a former student or colleague from Chifubu or Kansenshi Secondary Schools, Njase Girls, Kwame Nkrumah Teachers’ College, or the University of Zambia, please share. Please share.

#JusticeForAnneFavorMukanda #HerLifeMattered