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"id": 239023,
"url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/239023/?format=api",
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"type": "speech",
"speaker_name": "Mrs. Ngilu",
"speaker_title": "The Minister for Health",
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"id": 111,
"legal_name": "Charity Kaluki Ngilu",
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"content": " Thank you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir. First of all, I would like to take this opportunity to thank all the hon. Members who contributed to the debate on Vote 11. I thank them, indeed, for the compliments and appreciations they have made. I am happy that they have noticed some improvements in the Ministry of Health. This has been as a result of the hard work of our technical team; the Permanent Secretary and his officers. Therefore, I thank them very much. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, I have listened and taken note of all the issues that have been brought out on the Floor of the House. I would like to say that up to now, we still have great challenges in the health sector. However, I also want to assure hon. Members that we are committed and we will continue addressing these challenges, and finding solutions to them. We are all aware of how the health sector had been run before. One of the issues that came out of the Floor, from hon. Members who contributed, was the gazettement of the Constituencies Development Fund (CDF)-constructed health facilities. I want to thank the hon. Members for the support they have given to the health sector. This is because as I go around the country, I see many health facilities that have been funded through the CDF. On our own part, as the Ministry of Health, we will gazette 600 of these facilities. We will also ensure that 300 of them are immediately operational. Those are the resources that we have. Therefore, we shall not be able to open all of them at once. But, at least, 50 per cent of them will be operational immediately. Others will be operated as and when more resources are available. As I said, we have already employed 2,420 health workers. These are nurses, clinical officers, medical laboratory technologists. All these will be sent to our facilities. We expect to employ more. This has been as a result of our development partners who helped us with resources to hire people on contract basis for three years. Thereafter, the Government will absorb them. Some hon. Members talked about the fees guidelines for private practitioners. I agree with them totally. We need to have guidelines because, as it is now, the policy appears to be promoting wealth before health. But our policy is health before wealth. Therefore, I have instructed the Kenya Medical Practitioners and Dentists Board to review the fees structure and come up with some proposals that are acceptable. The Ministry will look into this. I will also table a Bill before Parliament to amend the Public Health Act, so that it is more comprehensive to address areas of the remuneration of medical professionals. This will make them more responsive to current health needs. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, I also heard from the Floor of the House issues of public medical personal engaged in private practice. This, again, is as a result of maybe, not properly remunerated personnel. This will also be looked into. I have once again, asked the Permanent Secretary to ensure that this is strictly adhered to, so that this practice does not continue in our facilities. I have listened to all the complaints that are coming from the Floor and they will certainly be addressed. In fact, we talked about it this afternoon. We said that we shall pin on our notice board a list showing which doctor or personnel officer should be working where and at what time so that, if a person is not there, people can call and say: \"This person is not here!\" We also ask members of the public not to accept to be removed from hospitals by doctors and told to go to their clinics. They should go, get treated and walk out. If they are told to pay, they should come to our Ministry and we shall deal with that. When we talk about corruption, I also call that corruption. 2962 PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES October 17, 2006 Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, hon. Members have talked well about the National Hospital Insurance Fund's (NHIF) new policy. I thank you for that. We still have the National Social Health Insurance Fund (NHSIF) Bill that was passed by Parliament. I do expect that when it comes back to the Floor of the House, we shall look at it again and make sure that it works. That is the direction to go if we are going to get more resources. I would like to say that the policy that was announced recently by NHIF is being tested. We are doing it on contracting arrangement between the health providers and NHIF, so that we can see whether it is workable. We are piloting that. We are going to make comprehensive proposals to see whether it is sustainable. It is a good thing if it works. That is another way of mobilising more resources for the health sector. Hon. Members talked about the availability of Anti-Retroviral (ARVs) drugs. I assure hon. Members that we have adequate ARVs in the country. Indeed, we have even scaled up. In the year 2003, we had only 2,000 people under treatment. Today, we have close to 80,000 under treatment. Our target between now and end of December is 140,000 people. We have put in place the Rapid Results Initiative (RRI). Every province has been given a target to achieve. If that happens - and we believe it will happen - we shall be able to put 140,000 people under treatment. That will leave about 60,000 out of treatment. We hope to get them on board by the end of next year. The problem that we had was lack of qualified personnel to administer ARVs. I have heard many hon. Members say that they would like it to be done at the village level. I would like to say that, that might not be possible. But we are opening as many comprehensive care centres as possible. But we do not have enough health workers to give people the treatment. In other words, it is not a matter of administering panadol. People need to be trained to do that. I have also heard about malaria control. We have scaled that up and we expect to reduce the number of people who get infected by malaria. We have put in place several interventions. We are also studying the issue of DDT but, in the meantime, we are using other chemicals for indoor residual spraying. We have seen a big difference. It is more effective than using the insecticide- treated nets. One hon. Member said that not everybody can use the nets, but we need to encourage our people to use nets. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, the issue of brain-drain has come up again and again. I do agree that we have lost many of our health workers. That is as a result of poor remuneration. We have addressed that. We have seen health workers, especially nurses, working in our country. I heard Mr. Kagwe say that we could train more, so that we could send them out of the country. But, first and foremost, we need to retain them for our own use. If we have more, they can go out of the country. We have started talking to the countries that have been taking our nurses and health workers. I think it is more useful to have them here than when they are out of the country. You also talked about inadequate specialised equipment. As I said, we were able to put in so much money to equip our health facilities last year. I am sure all of you here were conducting"
}