Katutura Intermediate Hospital head Nelago Amagulu has blasted tender entrepreneurs for poor workmanship which burdens medical staff and hampers their work.
Amagulu, who was showing parliamentarians around the maternity ward and part of the hospital yesterday, expressed her frustration with some of the tender entrepreneurs who do not do their jobs according to hospital specifications.
The parliamentary standing committee on information, communication, technology and innovation was on a familiarisation visit to Katutura Intermediate Hospital.
The committee consists of Swapo parliamentarians Gotthard Kasuto and Nono Katjingisua, Landless People’s Movement chief whip Henny Seibeb and Popular Democratic Movement (PDM) legislator Winnie Moongo.
Amagulu took the parliamentarians through an old and dilapidated maternity ward with holes in the roof, damaged walls and skirtings, as well as decayed corridors.
“It is clean, it is only the infrastructure that is old and damaged,” she told lawmakers about the condition of the wards.
Amagulu said the construction of hospitals is not meant for every construction company.
“As much as we want to empower Namibians, we must ensure that the technical capabilities are there first, and that is really important,” she said.
Katutura Intermediate Hospital is one of many state medical facilities in decay.
To fix these woes, the health ministry has said it needs
N$16 billion to strengthen the limping public health sector.
The Cabinet in August approved additional funding for critical activities and interventions for health systems for the next five financial years.
“Cabinet took note of the measures undertaken to date and planned actions, and Cabinet approved the proposed critical activities and interventions to enhance human resource capacity, infrastructure development, provision of essential pharmaceutical and clinical supplies, procurement of medical equipment, acquisition of ambulances and strengthening of primary healthcare services,” notes the briefing on Cabinet decisions.
Amagulu said the plans to construct a section for a unit for premature babies has to be specialised and not just given to any tender entrepreneur.
“When you bring in all the specialised elements, the piping, the electrical points, all of that, you are not going to get it under N$20 million for 30-bed capacity. So, we just have to get it right,” Amagulu said.
Meanwhile, Kasuto and the committee noted that the ward is clean and commended the team responsible.
UNCLEAN LAUNDRY
Amagulu also said those responsible for linen laundry are not doing their jobs effectively.
Linen and its laundering seem to be a repetitive issue in most health facilities in the country, she said.
“Because most of these companies are not specialised laundromats, they are just laundry companies who own a government tender to clean hospital linen.”
Amagulu said the expectation for the laundering of linen is that special agents are needed to remove stains such as blood and other bodily liquids.
“So, if you are saying as a company if it has stains and I am not removing the stains, sorry, what are you getting paid for?
“You’ve got a special tender for hospital laundering.”
She said bidding documents specified the use of special agents because they will be receiving “really stained material”.
“So, essentially what you want is to receive clean linen that you don’t have to put in extra effort to clean in order to bring back to the hospital.”
An example Amagulu used was when the hospital sent a pile of white linen for cleaning and it returned brown.
“They were washed but they were brown and they brought it back. This is not good, we sent it back. They went to clean that linen and brought back white linen,” she said.
Amugulu said this demonstrates contractors are able to do it but do not want to spend more money to do the extra work.
“If the linen is washed properly, it can last up to 10 years but if things continue the way they are, we will need to buy new linen every year,” she said.
WAITING FOR AGES
Meanwhile, parents have been waiting since 18 September to receive the HIV test results of their babies born at Katutura Intermediate Hospital.
Emma Keendjele, a registered nurse at the hospital’s maternity ward, said parents wait for weeks to receive their results from the laboratory where the tests are done.
“I think the last time we received the results was the 18th of last month, until today we still don’t have results based on the backlog. Parents are coming. They want to know if their babies are positive or negative and the problem is we really, really would like to have either access to receive the results ourselves or at least a computer,” she said.
ELEVATOR STRESSES
Two out of the seven elevators in the hospital are operational.
Amagulu said these also break down often.
“But usually you have two functional lifts. The third one is working today and not working tomorrow, these two completely need to be replaced,” she said.
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