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WORLD NEWS Monday 14 January 2019

Bare-handed surgeries as Zimbabwe's health system collapses

HARARE, Zimbabwe (AP) — death on the strike. They
A doctors' strike in Zimba- carried his coffin out to a
bwe has crippled a health waiting truck.
system that was already Poor funding is a major
in intensive care from ne- cause of the health sys-
glect. It mirrors the state tem's collapse, said Itai
of affairs in a country that Rusike, director of Com-
was full of promise a year munity Working Group on
ago with the departure Health, a non-governmen-
of longtime leader Robert tal organization.
Mugabe but now faces Zimbabwe's finance minis-
economic collapse. ter has allocated $694 mil-
Doctors describe grim con- lion for the health sector
ditions: Bare-handed sur- in 2019 against an annual
geries. Plastic bread bags need of $1.3 billion. To re-
used to collect patients' turn the sector to its former
urine. Broken-down ma- glory days, the health min-
chines. Zimbabwe's health istry said it needs about $8
sector, once considered billion, which is the entire
one of the best in Africa, is government budget for
on its knees. 2019.
"It's so sad. The hospitals The burden falls on impov-
are empty, the patients In this Jan. 9, 2019, photo, a family collects the body of their son who died at Parirenyatwa Hospital erished patients.
are being turned away to in Harare, Zimbabwe. "The hospital has nothing
die somewhere else," said Associated Press but we are running out of
Prince Butau, treasurer of money because the phar-
the Zimbabwe Hospital Government hospitals were for some elderly patients. Monday. In the pediatric macies are demanding
Doctors Association, which paralyzed by the five-week "What we were doing was section, beds were empty U.S. dollars," said Nobert
represents about 1,000 doctors' strike that "be- not to treat patients. Pa- while other wards were Nzonzo, who accompa-
doctors who anchor gov- grudgingly" sputtered to tients feel you have done barely occupied as the nied his 77-year-old father
ernment hospitals. an end on Thursday with something but you would hospital, like others, only for dialysis at Parirenyatwa
A new president's promises no resolution for their de- have done nothing. That's accepted the direst of cas- Hospital.
of change have turned out mands. The end brings no not medicine," he said. es. At times, they have spent
to be empty. improvement in conditions. Early this month, Mnan- Patients began to trickle an entire day without be-
"Affordable quality health In November, the Zimba- gagwa cut short his annual in after some doctors re- ing helped due to machine
care guaranteed," read bwe Medical Association, leave to help resolve the turned, but on the day the breakdowns while the doc-
campaign billboards for which represents health doctors' strike. The problem strike ended, one family tors' strike means his father
President Emmerson Mnan- workers, warned that pa- may widen after the Apex at Parirenyatwa said they could not be checked for
gagwa, a former Mugabe tients were "relapsing" and Council, which represents were collecting the body catheter-associated infec-
protege, ahead of the July "deteriorating" while opera- all government workers, of their son and blamed his tions, Nzonzo said.q
2018 election. Six months tions were being cancelled on Tuesday gave notice to
after he narrowly won the due to shortages of medi- strike if Zimbabwe's govern-
disputed vote, Zimbabwe's cines. ment fails to pay salaries in
health sector has wide- The situation, coupled with U.S. dollars.
spread shortages of basic low salaries, forced doctors The government has said
medicines such as painkill- to strike, Butau said. it cannot afford to pay
ers and contraceptives. Without adequate gloves, in dollars, Zimbabwe's de
Mnangagwa and others in doctors sometimes use their facto currency. Many gov-
the country's political and bare hands while masks ernment workers are paid
economic elite receive and goggles are nonexis- in quickly devaluing elec-
medical care mainly in tent, he said. "We are ex- tronic money instead, forc-
neighboring South Africa, posed to fluids, blood spill- ing them to tap the black
while Mugabe frequently age, HIV and hepatitis B." market at risk of arrest.
visits Singapore for treat- He has seen rope used in At government hospitals,
ment. place of bandages. "We the situation has been des-
At home, everyday Zim- cannot keep on doing perate.
babweans seeking health that," he said. At Parirenyatwa Hospital,
care have had to bring One of the striking doc- the largest in Zimbabwe,
their own drugs, syringes, tors, Wallace Hlambelo, the usually busy corridors
bandages and, at times, described using everyday were silent when The As-
water. plastic bags with catheters sociated Press visited on