Chituwo's careless talk
Chituwo's careless talkBy Editor
Friday February 08, 2008 [03:00]
It is always important for one to think or consider carefully before opening one’s mouth. It is impossible to have control of the words that have already been uttered. The only privilege we have is to think before we say anything. This is because words are like bullets; if they escape, one cannot retrieve them. Words can hurt, destroy or cause injury and they are not easily retracted.
Health minister Dr Brian Chituwo’s statement on Wednesday that ignorance, or lack of reading, among health workers and the public caused the recent panic among members of the public following information that Depo Provera, a contraceptive drug, was contaminated with an HIV virus.
This statement from Dr Chituwo is not only careless but also very dangerous because it has the potential to erode people’s confidence in our health care providers. To put it simply, Dr Chituwo is not inviting our people to have confidence in his health workers because they are not well-read and therefore can easily mislead and misinform the public.
While we agree with Dr Chituwo that the reading culture among our people, including professionals, is not as it should be, we think it is not correct for him to relate this problem of Depo Provera to the lack of reading. It is clear that Dr Chituwo doesn’t seem to have a clear-cut solution to present to Zambians on this matter.
How can Dr Chituwo accuse health workers of alarming the nation when it is him who held a press briefing to inform the nation that his ministry had withdrawn the Depo Provera following claims or suspicions that the drug was contaminated with HIV? Dr Chituwo said initial investigations revealed that the drug was testing positive to anti-bodies and that no HIV was detected although investigations would continue.
Now Dr Chituwo is saying if those ‘alarmist’ health workers had read human biology, they could have realised that HIV could not survive in a chemical like Depo Provera. If this is the case, why did Dr Chituwo tell the nation during his press briefing that investigations were continuing? Why did they have to send samples to South Africa when the well-read officials around Dr Chituwo knew very well that HIV could not survive in an environment like Depo Provera?
Let those who are charged with the responsibility of looking after the welfare, especially the health, of our people not take things for granted. Yes, we know that health workers are not educated in the same way.
There are those who are more educated than others. But we know that even those who are sufficiently educated in this field had some legitimate concerns and questions to raise about what was discovered in Depo Provera.
As Dr Chituwo would know better, the question was first raised by health institutions where the test was done first. Slowly and over some days, this information leaked into the public domain. The information was captured by the private sector that also tested Depo Provera and even the polio vaccine, which also tested positive for HIV.
What this implies to a medical practitioner is that there could be in the Depo Provera and polio vaccine, particularly in the batches obtained from the Ministry of Health donated by USAID, a substance, which is closely related to the proteins that are produced by an individual who is infected with HIV.
The question that should be answered by Dr Chituwo is: what could this substance be? Medical professionals could just read as much; they have no resources or capacity to investigate. Maybe that is why Dr Chituwo sent those samples to South Africa at great cost.
And why, of all medical products, should the Depo Provera and polio vaccine test positive? We have to realise that these drugs are widely used because they are free. We are reliably informed that the specificity and sensitivity of the HIV test kits are usually over 99 per cent.
This means they are very sensitive. So whatever tests positive should be 99 per cent related to the actual proteins produced when one is infected with HIV virus.
The question is; could the Depo Provera samples contain such a substance?
Would Dr Chituwo be in the position to confirm to the medical fraternity what this substance could be? Wouldn’t it be remotely possible that these samples could be containing a ‘vaccine’ to HIV without the knowledge of our people? What would be Dr Chituwo’s comments on the polio vaccine questions or is he waiting for the media to alarm the nation? Can Dr Chituwo assure the women that have received this Depo Provera in the past donated by USAID that they would not test positive to HIV even when they are not infected with HIV?
It is said that there is no smoke without fire, so there is every need to get to the bottom of this issue before we endanger the lives of our people. We need to strengthen our regulatory bodies to ensure that whatever comes into our country is good enough for the consumption of our people.
If Dr Chituwo thinks that the medical practitioners were just alarming the nation, why is the Depo Provera still off the shelves of our health centres, especially the public ones? If he is sure that Depo Provera has no contamination, why hasn’t Dr Chituwo announced that our women should feel free to continue using the drug?
Why withdraw the drug if it is safe? If Dr Chituwo is 100 per cent sure that there is nothing wrong with Depo Provera, we challenge him to withdraw all those circulars he issued to our health institutions stopping the use of this drug and announce today that our women should feel free to use Depo Provera.
There is need to be sincere about issues. We do not think that whoever discovered that Depo Provera was testing positive to an HIV test meant to alarm the nation. We think that everyone was genuinely apprehensive and legitimately sought to establish the correct position on this matter in the interest of good health.
If mistakes were made, let them be sincerely acknowledged instead of pouring scorn and ridicule on our health workers.
If these workers are ignorant as Dr Chituwo suggests, we will hasten to note that the well-read Dr Chituwo himself must be the biggest culprit for sending samples to South Africa for investigations when he knew very well that HIV cannot survive in an environment like that of Depo Provera.
Instead of politicising the matter, Dr Chituwo should show leadership and calmly allay the fears of our people about Depo Provera and polio vaccines. If indeed Depo Provera has no HIV and if this is properly explained, no one will argue with Dr Chituwo or any of his officials.
But if he chooses to be clever and unjustifiably sarcastic, he will just be making his job more difficult for himself. Dr Chituwo should always remember that words are like bullets. So let him speak with care. Arrogance will not do him any good.
Labels: BRIAN CHITUWO, HIV/AIDS
posted by MrK @ 4:30 PM
2 Comments:
careles talk indeed!!! Dr Chituwo himself can't even practice now because he is a politician. It just show that our Chituwo is also not well read.
The other reason we can advance is that he is a bad leader because he can not shift the blame on junior officers when he too is part of the team.
Ano-
You can excuse Chituwo because his statement was written by his Ministry of Health spokesperson a medical doc. Come to think of it what is Dr Banda doing as spokesperson? His qualifications do not match his position..hope these are some of the issues in the audit report because this is a case of misapplied resources.
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