Chitipa DHO not funded in June
Chitipa District Health Office (DHO) has scaled down all services due to lack of funding.
The DHO did not receive its funding for other recurrent transactions (ORT) in June from government and its May and June funding from the Norwegian Agency for Development (Norad).
Speaking in an interview on Thursday, Chitipa district health officer (DHO) Eugine Katenga-Kaunda said health centres are also affected making it hard for them to make referrals to the district hospital.
He said Chitipa District Hospital kitchen is also about to close as it now has three 50 kilogrammes (kg) bags of maize flour and five 50 kg bags of beans in stock which cannot last to the next allocation.
This has, therefore, forced the hospital to call upon well-wishers to support its services.
He said the DHO has stopped conducting outreach clinics, which among others, offers cervical cancer screening services and sensitisation campaigns.
Said Katenga-Kaunda:“At risk are children and pregnant women who need to be referred from health centres or from the district hospital to Mzuzu Central Hospital (MCH) for tertiary treatment.”
He said the hospital only has 60 litres of fuel in reserve for the generator and vehicles until the next funding.
The district uses 6 000 litres of fuel in a month.
He said the DHO received K2.7 million funding for May which was depleted in June.
Ministry of Finance, Economic Planning and Development spokesperson Nations Msowoya said he was not aware of the Chitipa DHO situation and needed time to find out why the hospital was not funded.
He said: “All hospitals were funded last month, maybe they have just not accessed it.”
On reduced funding from a planned K10 million ($22 222) to K2.7 million ($6000), Msowoya said although there is an agreed cash flow, monthly funding depends on available revenue.
