Government, show Malawians you care!

The situation at Kamuzu Central Hospital (KCH), as disclosed by a medical workers’ petition to Parliament is pathetic and unacceptable. Unacceptable because good health is critical for any country’s development. People that have poor health cannot meaningfully contribute to development.

Sadly, this is not the first time medical workers have petitioned government. Last year, doctors at the same hospital petitioned President Joyce Banda over another critical drug and equipment shortage.

The health workers’ concern is justified, particularly with news of the Capital Hill cash-gate where billions of kwacha have been abused at the expense of people’s welfare. Indeed, medical practitioners work to save lives, not to turn helpless people away or see them die because there are no drugs and equipment at the hospital. What good is a hospital without essential medicines and supplies? What are medical workers supposed to do on their own, without the essentials that make their job worthwhile?

The petition from the helpless and frustrated medical workers at KCH, which reveals that the hospital has been operating on meagre resources for some time, is touching, to say the least. What it means is that even the health workers’ lives are at risk, as they work without protective gloves and other essentials. No wonder they have threatened to down tools if government does not move to improve the situation.

But this need not be the case. Government should not have to wait for the medical workers’ public outcry to act on the situation or talk about it, especially, as the health workers say, they had been notifying government of the situation but nothing seems to change.

It is disappointing that government chose not to give a true picture of the status of the hospital, making us wonder whether it values lives of its people at all.

As far as we can see, government’s failure to acknowledge the situation will not help matters. The situation will not resolve itself. Government needs to step in and do something.

When government cut the budgetary allocation to the Health Ministry, it should have put in place an alternative way of ensuring that the supply of essentials such as drugs and equipment does not suffer. Simply assuming the situation would take care of itself shows government’s negligence to say the least.

We urge government to show that it is in control. This requires immediate action on the ground and a serious change of attitude towards things that matter to Malawians. Malawians lives cannot continue to be put on the line.