Kyotera||Kalisizo Hospital in Kalisizo town council, Kyotera district on Friday received a donation of more than 200 Coronavirus (COVID19) doses and personal protective equipment including twenty coveralls, eye safety goggles and gumboots to help in the treatment of patients.
The donation by John Paul Mpalanyi, the Kyotera County MP, is mainly meant to treat the sick health workers and other patients and to protect the frontline staff from contracting the deadly disease.
The donation has come at the time when the hospital is grappling with a lack of enough Covid drugs, oxygen cylinders, and an X-ray machine to help determine the extent of damage of the Covid patients’ lungs yet the facility lacks a special Covid treatment ward.
While handing over the drugs and equipment, Mpalanyi said that he only responded to the hospital’s outcry over the severe shortage for these specific items needed to treat the ill-fated patients amid the increasing number of cases and deaths.
So far 18 health workers have been infected with covid19 while two have on oxygen yet the hospital has recorded nine deaths of patients who are not health workers.
“If general hospital lacks key medical facilities to treat Covid patients or to protect our frontline staff it means they will get scared to handle the patients and the patients may die. We lost our experience pharmacist to the Covid and several health workers are currently infected,” he said.
Mpalanyi further pledged to lobby more support for the hospital and appealed to the Kyotera business community and well-wishers to support the hospital in times of need for the good of the people.
He added that much as it is the government that is responsible for equipping the hospital it’s of good practice to for district leaders to come in when government delays to fulfil its mandate.
He further said that the government has shifted the focus off campaigns against traditional diseases such as HIV/AIDS, Tuberculosis and others and concentrated on Covid19. “We need to widen the scope and also look at HIV/AIDS and others while strengthening the fight against the new pandemic (Covid),” he said.
Emmanuel Ssekyeru, the Kalisizo Hospital Medical Superintendent, said the donation come at the right time when it’s needed most. He added that they have been struggling to treat patients without enough drugs.
He explained that the hospital has so far registered a cumulative number of 216 Covid patients while two health staff, are on oxygen.
Ssekyeru said that they have ten oxygen cylinders adding that they need at least 20 to help not only those in a severe Covid condition but also patients with other conditions that require oxygen.
“On average we get between 10 and 20 people who test positive of covid. And due to the lack of a treatment facility, we may end up admitting putting them in a ward which may scare away patients with other health conditions,” he noted.
According to Ssekyeru, the hospital has been operating without an X-ray for over four years since it broke down yet the machine is very important in the treatment of covid patients.
“We cannot establish the extent of damage of the patients’ lungs that’s why we refer them to Masaka RRH for X-ray services. We tried all efforts but it was beyond repair and the government has not replaced it,” he added,
However, Patrick Kintu Kisekulo, the Kyotera LCV Chairman, applauded Mpalanyi for the donation saying that it will keep the hospital for some time as they wait for government intervention.
He further appealed to the residents not to overwhelm the hospital and urged them to seek Covid treatment from lower health units in their communities.
“We have a plan to start a private wing at Kalisizo general hospital for the able-bodied to pay for the medical services which will support various hospital operations such as buying necessary equipment and others,” he said.
Fortunate Rose Nantongo, the Kyotera Woman MP, said that Kyotera is a border district that’s receiving people from Tanzania and other countries yet it has no treatment facility for the pandemic.
However, she noted, the patients from the Kalisizo hospital and other lower health units are referred to Masaka RRH treatment centre, which is already overwhelmed by the Covid patients.
She further said that since Kyotera did not benefit from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) emergency loan of USD491.5M in 2020.
However, she added, they expect all health facilities to benefit from another IMF loan in 2021 of about shs3.5 trillion for the good of the people.
“As Kyotera we did not benefit from the first loan and we wondered what happened to the funds. This time we are going to monitor how the government spends the second loan it acquired this year and to ensure that the hospitals benefit from it,” she said.
END
English 