Thousands of patients countrywide in need of medical attention were turned away in public hospitals manifesting disturbing scenarios as they are forced to withstand untold suffering and desperation.
This was and still is the situation in public health facilities as doctors launched a nationwide strike over inadequate insurance benefits and lack of protective equipment (PPE) while treating COVID-19 patients.
Cabinet Health Secretary Mutahi Kagwe and the Ministry officials have continued on their hardline stance demanding that doctors, clinical officers and nurses resume duty unconditionally or face the sack.
However, the health practitioners have made good of their threat until their demands to be provided with Personal Protective Equipment (PPEs) are met.
They maintain they are safer off from work instead of being super spreaders of COVID-19 virus to their patients and families due to lack of the requisite materials.
The country’s health facilities are facing a crisis after doctors joined other health workers to demand better pay, medical insurance coverage and better protective equipment to help them combat the coronavirus pandemic.
The strike began yesterday after the Kenya Medical Practitioners, Pharmacists and Dentists Union (KMPDU) said on twitter that there had been no resolution of grievances raised over the last eight months.
“The Kenya government has neglected the welfare, safety and health of health care workers. No provision of medical insurance, workman injury benefits and compensation and
Chibanzi Mwachonda, the Secretary General (SG) KMPDU while attending the funeral of the doctor who died of the coronavirus in Kisii county said that the government is yet to accept their demands.
“Doctors across the country today can no longer wait; we will not engage in hazardous and dangerous work environment,” he said.
“We will not engage without assurance of our treatment, assurance of compensation to the young families that most doctors have and assurance of employment. There is no point in training doctors and not employing them. So today begins a nation strike notice by KMPDU we remain available and after this we hope that we will engage come tomorrow to find resolutions to this matter.”
The strike was due to start on December 7, 2020 but was postponed for two weeks to allow more time for talks with the government.
Wycliffe Oparanya said that it is unfair for doctors to go on strike during the pandemic and that appropriate action will be taken against striking medics.
“If they decided to go on strike also, let’s take stunt action against them, we shall remove them from the payroll. I have directed that we carry out recruitment of other nurses,” he said.
Mwachonda said that the only way they will go back to work is if their demands are met.
“No amount of intimidation, no amount of threats will make doctors go back to work,” he said. “I will say it very clearly and again; court orders will not stop this strike, court orders will not stop doctors from dying, court orders will not stop infections or reduce infection amongst doctors. It’s our lives and we have been pushed to the wall. We gave 21 days, we extended further 14 days so a total of 35 days — decisions have to be made now on these matters.”
The clinical officers’ union has been engaged in talks with government officials to find ways to end the strike.
The union chairman, Peterson Wachira, said that it is not safe for them to return to work.
Today, Kisumu governor Anyang Nyong’o has said that striking doctors in the county will be fired if they don’t resume work by Saturday.
The governor gave the health worker up to Saturday to resume their duties or face action.
“We call upon the health workers to come back to work by latest Saturday, anybody who doesn’t come back to work will have been deemed to have voluntarily abandoned their position,” he said.
The Ministry of Health has threatened to fire medical workers if the strike continues.