Counties facing healthcare crisis

By JAMES ANYANZWA

The parliamentary committee on health has described the health sector as a time bomb following the devolution of its functions.

The committee headed by Kitui South legislator Rachel Nyamai yesterday revealed that chaos and disorder have engulfed the health sector, paralysing operations of health facilities and putting lives of millions of Kenyans at risk.

The committee warned that health services in counties could grind to a halt in the next two months owing to lack of funds.

This, the committee said, has been compounded with the resignation of a growing number of medical doctors and delayed payment of salaries to health workers.

Nyamai  said the confusion in the health sector was going to cost this country dearly.

“You can see that we have a serious problem in the health sector. Money has already been devolved to the counties but have not reached any facility,” said Nyamai.

The confusion in the health sector has also led to the increased resignation of doctors.

“This week I have received seven resignation letters from doctors. Before September, we had a good distribution of doctors in the country,” said Dr Francis Kimani, Director of Medical Services.

The damning revelations came even as it emerged that some staff in the Ministry of Health have gone for more than two months without pay after some of its vote was erroneously transferred to the county governments.

Principal Secretary in the ministry of Health Fred Sigor said the ministry is unable to pay salaries for some workers.

Return cash

“We want to appeal to the Treasury to ensure that some of our money which were erroneously transferred to the counties need to be returned,” Sigor said.

The committee took issue with the Transition Authority saying it had failed in its mandate of providing a phased approach towards the devolution of health functions.

“There is a serious problem with the devolution of health and I can say this without fear of contradiction that healthcare should not have been devolved. Education was not devolved, security was not devolved why devolve health?” posed Nyamai.

“We are going to look for interventions so that this matter regarding devolution is brought on the floor of the House,” she said.