Financial crisis hits health training institutions

Some more health training institutions are  on the verge  of closing following government’s failure to fund the institutions, health stakeholders to a meeting in Mzuzu have confirmed.

During Human Resources for Health (HRH) Coalition consultative meeting with college management in the North yesterday in Mzuzu, it was established that some institutions such as St John Nursing College in Mzuzu have already closed and others such as St Luke in Zomba are sending students home due to lack of funding.

HRH coalition project manager Benson Phiri said the coalition is irked by the financial crisis hitting the training institutions.

He said it is worrisome to see institutions closing prematurely when the country has acute shortage of health personnel.

“We will meet the parliamentary committee on health and that of finance before Parliament closes, and we will also meet Ministry of Finance and Ministry of Health so that they appreciate the crisis,” said Phiri.

St Luke’s principal Maxwell Pangani said the college has sent students home on Monday as it could not afford keeping them with a deficit of K34 million.

“Mostly, the ones affected are those in third year and second year, about 150 of them. Government did not give us the allocation for July to September and is yet to give us for October to December, so we could not keep the students.

“We kept them from July using other funds but that is not sustainable as we may end up closing the whole school,” said Pangani.

Ministry of Finance spokesperson Nations Msowoya said the institutions deal directly with Ministry of Health on funding.

Ministry of Health spokesperson Henry Chimbali said he had no information on the funding.