Nathan Etengu
21 November 2006
Kampala — The Ministry of Health will soon issue a directive that all deaths of mothers and infants under five, which occur in health units to be reported to the ministry.
Dr. Stephen Malinga, the minister for health, said last week that President Yoweri Museveni was interested in knowing the circumstances under which mothers in labour and children under five years died even after reporting to health units.
He was officiating at the inauguration of the board for Mbale Regional Referral Hospital.
Malinga said health workers in whose hands the deaths occurred would have to give detailed reports for submission to the president. A ten-member board under the chairmanship of Dr. Dominic Waburokho was sworn in. Other members were drawn from the districts of Kapchorwa, Sironko, Mbale, Pallisa and Butaleja.
"We shall demand for the reports on infant and maternal mortality that occur in hospitals. The medical superintendents will be tasked to put their staff on their toes," Malinga said.
"This is unacceptable. It does not feel good for a woman who has come to deliver in hospital to die after she has reached in the hands of the people who ought to have saved her life and that of her baby," Malinga said.
He said negligence of duty and arrogance by some medical personnel caused the increasing infant and maternal mortality deaths in health units.
Malinga said patients often spent long hours without attendance while some medical officers preferred to make prescriptions on phone.
"No body called you to the profession. You should therefore be careful because there are so many lawyers out there who will start using nurses to provide them with cases to pursue in the courts of law," Malinga said.
He said it was against the medical profession for medical staff to go on strike.
"The long term objective of the ministry is to grant autonomy to all the regional and national hospitals," Malinga said.
Waburoho appealed to the board members to identify ways of generating funds for running the hospital.
He said Masaba wing, a private wing in the hospital was underutilised and that the little funds that it generated were channelled back to the Government.
Waburoho said the hospital was over-crowded with cases that ought to have been handled at the lower health units.
He also pointed out that the role of the regional referral hospital be defined to enable it handle cases it was required to deal with.
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