Tuesday's Child (Holby City)
The episode was filmed entirely on location in Ghana as part of the BBC's "Africa Lives" season, exploring African culture for UK audiences.
Travelling to the airport for her flight home, Diane and Ric come across a woman in labour, Joanna (Akofa Edjeani Asiedu), who is also suffering from malaria and having trouble breathing.
Ric confronts his brother about Esi, and Kumi tells him that their father died of AIDS, but the family kept it secret to avoid bringing shame on themselves.
[5] Discussing Ric's motivations in "Tuesday's Child", Quarshie explained that his character was born there, and was "always meant to return at some point", leading to issues with his family.
[11] He expanded that in leaving Holby, Ric aimed to escape "the politics and stresses in his own life", stating: "It's somewhere he can recharge himself by getting back to uncomplicated medicine.
While the end of the episode sees Ric choose to stay in Ghana, Quarshie remained in Holby City, with his character returning to the series soon thereafter.
[13] His character proved so popular that Edmondson reprised the role twice in 2005, and signed a six-month contract in 2006, with series producer Emma Turner commenting that: "He made a huge impact in the few episodes that he was involved in.
[17] Edmondson ultimately departed from the series to pursue a full-time music career as part of the folk band The Bad Shepherds.
[20] Following the episode's completion, the Holby City production team in conjunction with the British High Commission gifted three flat-screen computers and a laser printer to the Elmina OLA Girls Boarding School.
Simon Massey of the BBC stated that the people of Elmina had been "extremely supportive" and played a large role during filming, and that the donated equipment was a way of giving something back to the community.
[24] Holby City was the second most-watched programme on BBC One in the week of broadcast, with only the soap opera EastEnders attaining higher ratings.
[22] Prior to the episode's broadcast, John McKie of the Daily Record commented that in setting special editions of Holby City, Ground Force and Rolf on Art in Africa, BBC One controller Lorraine Heggessey was contradicting her desire to provide an alternative to negative coverage of the continent.
[25] The Western Mail criticised the build-up to the episode, writing that Holby City had abandoned its roots as a medical drama, concentrating instead on "wholly unbelievable" relationships between its main characters, with patient-care now incidental to inter-collegiate romances.
Television critic Jim Shelley of the Daily Mirror called it "mad but brilliant",[27] and the Sunday Mercury selected the episode as recommended viewing.
"[29] "Reflecting the Real World", a 2006 report examining the portrayal of Africa on British television, found that "Tuesday's Child" was one of the most popular programmes amongst those shown to viewers, alongside a Channel 4 documentary on AIDS and a BBC series following teachers and pupils in Uganda.
Neera Dhingra of Voluntary Service Overseas (VSO), one of the organisations which commissioned the report, commented that, "The people who took part in our focus groups were very clear that they liked positive and transformative television, characters that they could relate to - basically good storytelling.
