Health staff strike, patients get stuck

Public health facilities’ workers yesterday downed their tools to push government to implement their increased allowances, a development that left patients stranded.

Spot-checks by The Nation yesterday established that the industrial action paralysed all major government and Christian Health Association of Malawi (Cham) health facilities nationwide.

The Nation checked Mzuzu Central Hospital, Kamuzu Central Hospital (KCH) in Lilongwe, Zomba Central Hospital (ZCH) and Queen Elizabeth Central Hospital (QECH) in Blantyre where the workers abandoned their work and sat in the grounds of their duty stations.

We also carried out spot checks in selected district hospitals.

Some of them danced while others carried placards calling on the government to honour their demands and increase allowances.

In Mzuzu, healthcare workers embarked on a sit-in at the central hospital and Mapale Health Centre.

Healthcare workers we spoke to said only emergency cases were attended to during the sit-in.

At KCH, patients, including those referred to the facility from district and other rural hospitals were sent back.

The health workers spent their day singing, dancing and playing music.

Their performance attracted patients and guardians who could not help it but watch the performances.

But despite getting entertained, the patients and guardians felt short-changed.

Matelena Yotamu, who travelled from Dedza for a check-up after undergoing an operation, said she was not attended to.

“I feel I have been treated unfairly. I have wasted money to come here. I sold a piece of land to raise transport money and only to be sent back,” she lamented.

Another patient, Jane Phiri from Area 25 in Lilongwe, who was experiencing abdominal pains and reported at KCH for check-up, was not attended to. She feared that her condition could worsen.

However, some guardians said their relations admitted to the hospital were being assisted.

One of the guardians, Rose Edson from Area 25, said her daughter, who developed complications after giving birth through caesarean section, was being attended to by doctors.

National Organisations for Nurses and Midwives in Malawi treasurer Andrew Ahmed Tambuli said the healthcare workers were only attending to emergencies.

He emphasised that government needs to address the issue so that all health services resume.

“This sit-in is continuous until [our demands] are met and to the satisfaction of the health workers,” said Tambuli.

The strike did not spare district and other rural hospitals.

Kasungu District Hospital spokesperson Catherine Yoweli confirmed that health workers at the facility were also participating in the sit-in, but could not comment further on the matter.

Dedza District Hospital spokesperson Mwai Liabunya said the matter was sensitive and could not comment. He said he feared that speaking on the issue would worsen the situation and affect those that are working.

Mchinji District Hospital spokesperson Owen Chatayika said the Ministry of Health spokesperson was better-placed to speak on the matter, adding that he was on holiday.

At QECH in Blantyre, patients arriving at the trauma department said they felt the sting of the sit-in from as early as 8am when they were left unattended.

The patients were made to wait for over an hour before registration started.

During a visit to the trauma department at QECH, The Nation found some health workers assisting patients, some of whom had been carried into the room on trolleys.

There were also health workers recording details of patients and checking their vital signs before sending them to another room for consultation.

In the maternity wing, we saw a health worker summoning a guardian to provide necessary materials as the patient they had brought was being assisted in the labour ward.

At lunch hour, we also witnessed several people leaving the hospital after being discharged from the wards.

According to one of the patients, Richard Mwale from Ndirande Township, Blantyre, he was supposed to go to the theatre yesterday for a procedure on a wound on his foot, but he was sent back because of the strike.

At  Zomba Central Hospital (ZCH) as well as Machinga and Mangochi district hospitals, healthcare workers also joined the sit-in although all the facilities had skeleton staff attending to patients.

The workers are demanding the government to increase their allowances, including locum rates as well as risk, government top-up and professional allowance. n

—Reporting by MACMILLAN MHONE, RALPH MVONA, GEORGE SINGINI, AYAMBA KANDODO AND HOLYCE KHOLOWA, Staff Writers