HTTP 200 OK
Allow: GET, PUT, PATCH, DELETE, HEAD, OPTIONS
Content-Type: application/json
Vary: Accept
{
"id": 238990,
"url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/238990/?format=api",
"text_counter": 150,
"type": "speech",
"speaker_name": "Mr. Awori",
"speaker_title": "The Vice-President and Minister for Home Affairs",
"speaker": {
"id": 290,
"legal_name": "Moody Arthur Awori",
"slug": "moody-awori"
},
"content": " Thank you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, for allowing me to join my colleagues in making a few remarks about this Vote. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, I believe that health service delivery in this country is one of the success stories of the Kibaki Administration. I think it is necessary that where there is success, we should be able to talk about it. It is not so long ago that whenever someone went to the hospital, the 2948 PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES October 17, 2006 service was really very poor. A doctor would have to ask you for an exercise book in which to write the prescription because the only medicine that was available at the time was Panadol and Asprin. At the moment, if you went to any dispensary, you would find all the medicine there. This scheme which has recently been introduced which allows anyone to be treated for any ailment is really the way forward and I want to thank the Minister, Ministry and all support staff for the excellent work they have done. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, there are only a few challenges that I would like to address myself to. I want to begin with the equitable distribution of the resources that are available. As concerns human resources, it is necessary that all the clinics, dispensaries and hospitals are properly and equitably staffed because sickness and illness is the same right across the country. Similarly, where equipment is concerned, it is necessary that the Ministry actually distributes this equipment equitably. Laboratory equipment is required in every hospital and dispensary. Ambulances should be distributed equitably so that there are not so many ambulances in one area and very few in another. We would like to see that being done. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, similarly, I want to request the Ministry of Energy to come to the assistance of the Ministry of Health to ensure that there is electricity in most hospitals. Recently, I visited Wamba Hospital. It is a referral hospital which serves a very big area including Marsabit, Meru and the whole of North Eastern Province. However, Wambaa Hospital at the moment uses a generator. It spends about Kshs900,000 a month just on a generator. Imagine what service they could be giving with that Kshs900,000 if this hospital was electrified. Its bill would probably be between Kshs70,000 and Kshs100,000. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, it is also necessary for electrification to be all around in the rural areas because in a good number of those places snake bites exist. For snake bites, it is necessary for its vaccine to be refrigerated. In my own constituency, the incidences of snake bites are very prevalent and it would help if all the hospitals had access to electricity. There are also incidences of polio coming back. The polio vaccine has got to be under refrigeration. Therefore, I believe that my colleague, the Minister for Energy, must come to the support of this Ministry so that we have vaccines and medicine properly stored. It is not just about having the medicine but we also need mortuaries in almost all hospitals. We can only have them if we had electricity. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, the other challenge that I would like the Ministry to direct themselves to is hospices. There are many terminally sick people and they really need to spend their last days in dignity and I do believe that hospices should not be left merely to Non- Governmental Organisations (NGOs). They should be part of our own Government service to ensure that hospices are available to terminally sick people. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, we need to put more money in research. I know that the Ministry works very closely with the Kenya Medical Research Institute (KEMRI). We need research particularly in herbal medicine as my colleague who spoke a few minutes ago said. We know that we people who were born and brought up in rural areas particularly many years back, there were no clinics and yet we were able to survive through herbal medicine. It is about time we put emphasis on research in herbal medicine. Currently, there are some people who are benefiting from herbal medicine. They are taking herbs from certain trees here and taking them to research stations abroad and then bringing them back as finished medicine. It is necessary that we should be able to make our people benefit through herbal medicine. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, similarly, there are these traditional healers and they have proved themselves. I think they need to be encouraged. There are people in the rural areas who are able to treat bone and nerve diseases like arthritis using their own hereditary skills and we need to encourage them. Gone are the days when we looked down upon the African medicine man. Of course, there were mercenary medicine men but there were also genuine ones and we need to October 17, 2006 PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES 2949 encourage them. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, there are other ailments that are coming up which have not been looked at very seriously and the Ministry needs to put some emphasis on them. People who are deaf, dumb and blind at the same time need specialised treatment. I would like to encourage the Ministry to help such people. There are other new medical complications like autism and we need to recognise that they exist in people. Autistic children exist and their parents do not know how to treat them and at the moment even the Ministry of Health has very little experience about how to treat this condition. It is important that the Ministry deals with this condition. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, there are also disabilities like the visually impaired. The Ministry of Health should provide these people with the white cane. I would like the Ministry of Health to urge the Ministry of Roads and Public Works to include the white cane in the Highway Code so that when drivers see a white cane, they know that they are dealing with a visually impaired person and thus drive carefully. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, similarly, we have got a spinal cord injury hospital up at the hill in Hurlingham and it has only 40 beds. We need to expand this hospital. I would request the Ministry of Health to support the efforts of an NGO called The Kenya Paraplegic Organisation (KPO) which currently is preparing to put up a rehabilitation centre worth Kshs100 million. Concerted efforts between NGOs and the Government can bear good fruit. However, we do not want to concentrate within Nairobi only but we would like various provincial hospitals to also have rehabilitation centres for the spinal injury patients because currently in Nairobi, due to shortage of beds, they are discharged very soon. With those few remarks, I beg to support."
}