Fri, 12 May 2017 12:56:00 +0000
THE total number of deaths recorded at the Lusaka City Council (LCC) burial office situated at the University Teaching Hospital (UTH) between 18th April and 08th May, 2017 is not only alarming but also an indication of the need for a multi-layered approach to preventive health care, adequate and relevant health education and off course a more responsive care system.
Shockingly, nine hundred and eighty (980) deaths were recorded within a three-week period. Statistically, it implies about forty seven (47) deaths were recorded on a daily basis, a figure that speaks of unacceptable levels of loss of life. The figure is too ghastly to contemplate.
Why should the UTH LCC burial office record such a horrifying number of deaths?
Much as it cannot be stated with certainty what the actual causes of these deaths are, suffice to say that the large percentage of lives lost must have been a combination of lifestyles and a health service delivery system that maybe over stretched and unable to cope with demand.
It is imperative to underscore that in order to achieve good health citizens must strive to adopt more active lifestyles with fewer dietary excesses to avoid falling prey to non-communicable or what are often referred to as lifestyle diseases including diabetes, high blood pressure. As the old adage goes, “prevention is better than cure”.
Be that as it may, limitations affecting the smooth operation of many public hospitals and clinics to which the majority of our people go to seek medical attention cannot be glossed over.
For instance, the UTH has for a long time been grappling with inadequate stocks of oxygen gas meant for emergency cases and a stable supply of blood to its blood bank.
If the UTH can face such challenges, what about public clinics and hospitals dependent on it for incidental services?
It is public knowledge that many public health facilities around the country have a very poor service delivery record which is attributed to a wide range of factors such as high patient/medic ratio, limited and often inconsistent supply of medicines and negligent attitude towards work among members of staff, to mention but a few.
On this score, the high mortality rate can be said to be partly a reflection of the lapses in the health care delivery system, and our health workers cannot be divorced from this problem.
In the past, health sector officials have attributed the high level of pilferage of medicines from health facilities to lack of monitoring in the distribution chain from the point of supply to the consumers.
However, to ascribe the pilferage of medical supplies solely to the weaknesses in the distribution chain from the Medical Stores to various clinics and hospitals would be too simplistic.
And to assert that doctors and nurses are not major culprits in the missing of drugs from public health facilities is living in self-denial. It is common knowledge that health personnel being ultimate handlers of medical supplies cannot be exempt from this vice.
Equally, it is well-known that many chemists that have opened in local markets or compounds are managed by either pharmacists, nurses or medical doctors coming from our public health institutions.
This being the case, it is needless to say that this poor, unresponsive health care delivery system is exacerbated by this cabal of unpatriotic, uncivil individuals, hence depriving patients access to requisite medicines in public hospitals.
More often than not, our medical doctors have habitually resorted to merely giving medical prescriptions to patients to procure medicines from chemists because the hospital pharmacies do not have medicines in stock.
What is more shameful to observe is that sometimes the same medical doctors issuing the prescription would direct the unsuspecting patient to purchase the medicines from their chemists.
This behaviour among health workers is retrogressive and is part of the problem that ultimately results in too many deaths, some of which could have been prevented.
We take cognizance of Government’s effort to enhance access to quality health services through upgrading of some clinics to Level 1 hospital status, but such strides will not yield the desired results if our health staff do not change their attitude towards work and quit the habit the practice of pilfering medicines from public health facilities.
The high death toll is a wakeup call to relevant authorities in the health sector to reflect on better ways of effective health services delivery methods to our people.
It is horrifying for the UTH LCC burial office to have recorded 980 deaths within twenty one (21) days. This is a death record shocker!
