Hundreds of health workers protest in Nairobi on April 16, 2024.
Reports of the alleged deaths of over 100 infants in Kiambu were swiftly denied by country health officials. It is also reported that the deaths happened during the doctors’ strike.
The issue is not the denials and counter-denials, but that the deaths occurred during doctors' and nurses' strikes. The patients would have had a higher chance of survival had the medics been working.
I understand it may sound insensitive to ask for medics to be banned from going on strike, given the poor working conditions in most hospitals on top of the poor pay they receive, but I don’t think Kenya can afford the luxury of having doctors and nurses on strike.
Doctors and nurses are crucial drivers of healthcare. Universal healthcare cannot be achieved without these key personnel and others required to drive the national health agenda. Neither should such key personnel be expected to work without motivation.
The main bone of contention has been about better pay. The other is a better working environment. Most of our medics work in hospitals that are poorly run, poorly built and under-resourced. Even finding gloves in some public hospitals is a challenge.
Re-nationalise healthcare
It is easy to blame doctors and nurses for going on strike, but the blame lies fairly and squarely at the doorstep of the government. Strikes by doctors and nurses have been happening for years now. This means that the government has done very little to accede to the fair demands by these medics on improving their pay and working environment.
Devolving healthcare has only made the situation worse for doctors and nurses. The counties have become a conduit for devolved corruption, and this has negatively impacted the development of healthcare in many counties. The more reason to re-nationalise healthcare to make it easier to manage and audit the Ministry of Health.
As the medics and government keep tussling over a few coins, innocent citizens die for lack of healthcare caused by greed, corruption, lack of compassion and financial motivation for doctors and nurses. It is simply wrong for the government to think medics should turn up for work without any remuneration.
Funding and medical personnel are two things that the government cannot compromise on if it wants success in its universal health coverage agenda. This is why it is important to not just fight but to end corruption in all departments in the Ministry of Health and in the county health departments.
The Hippocratic oath that doctors take as part of their training emphasises the need to “help the sick”. One principal even calls upon physicians to “avoid intentionally causing harm or injustice to patients”. The tenets of this oath seem to have been forgotten by doctors in Kenya, who have been putting the lives of patients at risk by denying them treatment while they go on strike.
As much as I sympathise with their plight, I believe doctors should respect the Hippocratic oath and put the interests of the patients first. There are many ways of making demands to the government for better pay and work environment without putting the lives of patients at risk and causing unnecessary deaths.
The Social Health Authority (SHA) receives contributions from Kenyans with a view to offering them healthcare. Aside from contributions from Kenyans, the Ministry of Health gets funding from the national government in every budget, and other agencies such as the Global Health Fund and foreign governments support healthcare in Kenya. Despite such support, the government seems to run empty coffers all the time.
Support doctors
Where does all the money go if not to corrupt people? It is wrong for patients to die because doctors are not being paid or remunerated accordingly. It is also wrong to take money from Kenyans through contributions to SHA and then frustrate their care by failing to support doctors and nurses who are crucial to providing healthcare to Kenyans.
Kenya does not have the luxury of having doctors on strike if it wants a strong economy and to achieve universal health coverage. The government has a legal and moral duty of care to the doctors and patients, and hence it must remunerate doctors well so as not to disrupt the healthcare system.
The deaths of patients attributed to doctors’ strikes are avoidable. The only way to stop such deaths is by banning strikes by doctors, but by the same token, making sure these health workers are better remunerated and their work environments are made conducive.
The government and doctors should otherwise be held to account following avoidable deaths during strikes. Patients are the innocent parties and shouldn’t lose their lives because the government and doctors are constantly fighting over money.
Ms Guyo is a legal researcher. [email protected], @kdiguyo.
