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Nawakwi is saying the truth - pastor Zulu

Nawakwi is saying the truth - pastor Zulu
By Chibaula Silwamba and Moses Kuwema
Thu 01 Apr. 2010, 04:01 CAT

Pastor Rabson Zulu of Mandevu Baptist Church yesterday said what FDD president Edith Nawakwi said about lack of medicines in some clinics in Lusaka is true. In a walk-in interview, Pastor Zulu urged the government to take what Nawakwi had said seriously because it was the real issue on the ground.

"Madam Nawakwi is speaking the truth. She is not mad...some clinics have no medicines. I am a BP high blood pressure patient myself and I always buy my own medicine because whenever I go to Matero referal health centre they always give me prescriptions instead of medicines," pastor Zulu said.

Recently, Nawakwi expressed concern on poor health service delivery.

But President Rupiah Banda and chief government spokesperson Lt Gen Ronnie Shikapwasha rubbished Nawakwi's observations.

President Banda said: “You don't go to one clinic and you don't find medicine there, then you say, 'there is no medicine in the clinics!' That is madness.”

And Health Workers Union of Zambia (HWUZ) yesterday charged that the government has built beautiful clinics and hospitals that look like hotels but without sufficient equipment and medical personnel to serve the people.

Commenting on Nawakwi's concern that the situation in clinics in Lusaka and other parts of Zambia was deplorable and government's rebuttal of the statement, HWUZ general secretary Lewis Mukosha acknowledged the inadequacies in provision of medical services, which he attributed to lack of equipment and shortage of health workers.

“With the health reforms that have been carried out in this country, we have come up with very beautiful buildings as clinics and hospitals. The most devastating part is that these clinics are looking like hotels, but they don't have the equipment which our communities can appreciate. Secondly, there is no human resource,” said Mukosha in an interview.

“The buildings are so beautiful but without staff and equipment. We want to commend the government for having built these beautiful buildings. We urge the government to ensure that it provides human resource. The government must provide the equipment for health personnel to use.”

Mukosha also expressed concern about the brain drain in the health sector and challenged the government to address the problem.

“Government should ensure that they motivate those health workers in order to retain them or else we are mopping the floor when the tap is running. We are training medical personnel at a cost and at the end of the course, they all go for greener pastures. In the end, we are the same people that are crying that 'we are training people; they go out,'” said Mukosha.

“What is happening now is that even the tutors that are training them are also running out. So we have a shortage of tutors in training schools.”

Labels: EDITH NAWAKWI, HEALTHCARE, LEWIS MUKOSHA, NEOLIBERALISM, RABSON ZULU

posted by MrK @ 3:02 PM