New Sh218m cancer machine idle as crisis bites

As desperate cancer patients possibly die, others lie on hospital beds and at homes, following collapse of the cancer treatment machine at Kenyatta National Hospital, it has emerged that a new Sh218 million cancer treatment equipment has been lying idle for over a month.

The radiotherapy machine known as linear accelerator secured by the tax payer has been at a warehouse owned by Kenya Revenue Authority (KRA). The facility was meant to be used at KNH.

The linear accelerator is idle just because the Government had not paid Sh2.3 million in licence fee to Radiation Protection Board.

Radiation Protection Board registers, inspects, licenses and enforces compliance with the Radiation Protection Act in all practices in the country. This is despite construction of the facility on which the plant will sit known as the banker which is situated at KNH having been completed in December at a cost of Sh300 million.

At the centre of the crisis is a licence to operate the modernised radiotherapy machine in the provision of more adequate cancer treatment at the country’s largest referral hospital as administration rushed to ‘repair and calibrate’ the only repairable radiotherapy model (cobalt) acquired in 2010.

Medical experts said the second one needs to be decommissioned after being in use for 23 years.

KNH has only two radiotherapy machines, cobalt model, serving at least 150 patients per day.

Even as questions linger over why the Government kept the facility idle regardless of the life-threatening crisis, it emerged that top Government officers were aware of its availability and only acted after public pressure began to build.

KRA continued to hold the facility until a licence allowing its usage in Kenya was obtained. Contacted for comment, Senior Communications Officer at KRA Maurine Njong’o would not immediately issue an official comment over linear accelerator except to say, “I am out of the office currently and thus unable to give you an official statement on that matter because I would have to consult and have no information about the same as we speak.

However as you know, it is our responsibility to protect the citizens against importation of materials that would otherwise affect their well-being. We cannot haphazardly release any sensitive item like that without certification. We insist on certification, we must be sure it’s fit to go to the market.”

Assemble it

The Standard on Saturday independently confirmed that the Government paid the license fee of Sh2.3 million Friday setting stage for usage of the facility.

But the facility will not commence operations immediately. KNH acting chief executive Simeon Monda said: “The machine would remain in the warehouse until a technical engineer from London arrives to assemble it.”

Dr Monda confirmed in a phone interview that the said licence was released to the hospital Friday.

“We received the licence today morning and we are set to take off with its setting up in the hospital premises,” he said.

Had the Government undertaken all steps in regard to procurement and installation of the facility, linear accelerator would have been in use by January. By the time of going to press, no explanation had been given for the delay.

Monda further said the new linear accelerator machine is expected to be used alongside the repaired cobalt machine to serve the high number of cancer patients requiring radiotherapy.

“The linear accelerator is a newer generation machine and more efficient and we expect to handle twice the number of patients as we also use the cobalt one that has just been repaired,” he told The Standard on Saturday in an interview.

However, Monda could not independently confirm whether the cost of radiotherapy with the use of the new accelerator machine would remain the same.

Ironically, Friday, at KNH Clinic 66 there was a breast and cervical cancer screening. Kenya is currently carrying a heavy cancer burden largely triggered by a shortage of affordable cancer treatment services and specialists.

In the last seven days, two machines at KNH broke down sending hundreds of Kenyans under radiotherapy treatment into a dilemma.

During radiotherapy treatment, the linear accelerator delivers high-energy x-rays to the region of the patient’s tumor destroying the cancer cells while sparing the surrounding normal tissue.

Modern linear accelerators also have internal checking systems to provide further safety so that the machine will not turn on until all the treatment requirements prescribed by the physician are perfect.

Interrupt services

Kenya Revenue Authority is also expecting demurrage fee of around Sh42,000 that should be paid after the Radiation Protection Board gives a greenlight for the use of the new machine at KNH.

The machine is expected to ease the burden of cancer treatment in Kenya where only two referral hospitals bear the burden of advance treatment of various types of cancers.

The breakdown of the two radiotherapy machines at the country’s largest referral hospital last week caused psychological trauma and left patients stranded.

Meanwhile acting chief executive officer Simeon Monda said that patients are expected to resume treatment on Monday. “Our radiotherapy staff will work beyond their scheduled time to cope with the patients’ backlog,” said Monda.

Even as Cabinet Health Secretary James Macharia said that patients had been diverted to Nairobi Hospital to attend to 50 patients per week free of charge, patients were apprehensive adding that the number of radiotherapy clients from KNH were more.

“The arrangement with government can only accommodate 10 patients per day for five week-days so that we do not interrupt our normal services with clients and also not to overwhelm our machines,” said a source at Nairobi Hospital adding that radiotherapy services only run from Monday to Friday.

In a recent meeting between the Ministry of Health and the National Cancer Institute of the United States cancer treatment on cancer infrastructure, concerns were raised that 40 per cent of cancer treatment facilities in private sector are idle, a paradox to about over 75 cancer deaths are recorded every day.

Some of the families with cancer patients that the cost of the same treatment provided at other health facilities were unaffordable and they have opted to stay at home until the ones at KNH were functional.

Most of the patients who spoke to The Standard on Saturday sought anonymity for fear of victimisation at KNH once the services resume.

“We visited one of the cancer centres and we were turned away because we did not have the required Sh3,000 per session yet at Kenyatta we would pay Sh500 per session,” said a patient who asked not to be named.

The Cabinet Secretary is expected to hold a press briefing today at KNH to address the cancer challenges at the hospital.