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Health budget cut irks Mhen

 

 

In a year Malawi has lost 30 lives to cholera and registered over 800 cases of the disease, government has reduced funding towards all district hospitals and the drilling of boreholes in rural areas.

The development has irked the Malawi Health Equity Network (Mehn)—a network of non-governmental organisations working in the health sector—which has asked government to reconsider its position on the matter.

According to the revised mid-year funding report for the 2017/2018 financial year, all district hospitals have seen a five percent funding reduction while the development of rural boreholes budget for all districts has been cut by 40 percent.

Malawi has so far lost 30 lives through cholera

Treasury spokesperson Davis Sado, in an e-mailed response last Thursday, admitted the health budget cuts but justified them, saying they were “performance-based”.

“The government attaches great importance to all sectors of the economy, and health remains one of the sectors where government is committed to ensure that people’s welfare is improved. As such, government, through Treasury, will always ensure that the health sector is well-supported in terms of financing and that Malawians are able to access essential health services,” Sado said.

He added that in terms of the 2017/18 Mid-Year Budget Review, the approved budget was revised based on the performance during the first-half of the financial year and projected performance of the budget in the second-half.

He said, as such, the expenditure budget was revised downwards by K9.3 billion to cover for the revised expenditures as the ministry had to reduce almost all budget lines.

“Treasury revises the budget at vote level, but the actual expenditure to be affected is done by respective MDA [Ministries, Departments and Agencies]. This applied to the issue at hand as a way of making sure that essential services are not affected. That is why government, through the Office of the President and Cabinet came up with guidelines on expenditure control measures and fleet management,” he explained.

The funding report we have seen shows that even districts that have been critically affected by the [cholera] outbreak

such as Lilongwe, Salima and Karonga have had their health and borehole budgets trimmed.

Lilongwe’s health budget was cut by K37.9 million, Karonga forfeited K9 million while Salima lost K12 million.

While some district commissioners would not gauge how they would cope with the trimmed budgets, some expressed worry at the development.

Machinga district commissioner (DC) Bester Mandere, in a telephone interview, said the district does not solely depend on government funding, which only caters for wages and other smaller items.

“Because of the emerging problems such as cholera, we are resting our hope on local partners who have been helping us,” he said, adding that councils already operate on tight budgets.

“We are already finding it difficult as our cash-flow projections are not met because sometimes we receive less funding than projected,” he said.

Ntcheu DC Smart Gwedemula said he had no idea how the district hospital would cope with the trimmed budget.

He said: “With the persistent blackouts, we have been using a lot of money to buy fuel for the standby generator. Now, if the funding is further cut, then we do not know how we will handle that.”

While Mzimba DC Thomas Chirwa said he would have to look at the funding report first before commenting on the situation in the district: “We might be affected by the changes but that will depend on the figures when we look at them.”

Among the districts with the largest funding cuts for development of rural boreholes are Lilongwe K37.9 million, Zomba K17.9 million, Ntcheu K15.3 million and Mzimba K14.1 million.

But Finance, Economic Planning and Development minister Goodall Gondwe, in a telephone interview yesterday, said Treasury this week approved additional funds towards district

hospitals.

He said: “In fact, [last Thursday] I approved an additional K3 billion towards district hospitals. They have been having difficulties with their finances, as such, when the Ministry of Health approached us, we decided to give them an additional sum.”

Mehn executive director George Jobe, in a telephone interview yesterday, said the cuts would put lives of poor Malawians at stake.

“If you look at these funding reductions, they cut across critical sectors such as health facilities at district level and sinking of boreholes in rural areas. These are critical in the promotion of good health for poor Malawians. That is why we are moving in to ask the government to reconsider its position in this matter. We are releasing a statement

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