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"content": "Just to give you a glimpse of what is happening in the country today, Siaya County, where I come from, its population compared to that in Busia, Homa Bay or Kericho, is the same if Busia does not have more people. But if I tell you the number of nurses in Siaya County today, you will be shocked; in the whole county that has Rarieda, Alego Usoga, Bondo, Gem and Ugenya constituencies. In three constituencies we have a paltry 164 nurses, but across the road in Busia we have 387 nurses. We have 164 nurses yet if you to the next county of Bungoma, we have 637 nurses. If you go to Narok, there are 310 nurses, Nandi has 350 and the population of some of these counties is lower than that of Siaya County by far. So we have 164 nurses and a similar or smaller number of clinical nurses against a huge number of health facilities. In my constituency, Ugenya Constituency, we run 12 dispensaries and health centers. We have a combined force of only five Government employed clinical officers for 12 health facilities. The rest are employed by NGOs and work on off. So, we have dispensaries that do not work and so people die every day. In my constituency, on a daily basis, I have to send money for my people to go to Busia. I have to send money to my constituents to go to Siaya, to which the fare is Kshs400 one way. So in some areas, where ailments are curable, and you can use less than Kshs100, we are using Kshs1,000 to access the nearest clinical officer. This is the case in most constituencies in this country; the long and short of this is that for us to provide the constitutionally sanctioned right to health, we must match the investment we make in the health sector with the words we use in our manifesto. When he was here last time, the President was very eloquent in saying that he wanted to meet the WHO requirement in health. That is why we provide in our Constitution that we are going to provide the best healthcare that we can ever get. In this country and you know very well--- Two weeks ago, the President of this country declared that he was waiving all the user fees in all the dispensaries, health centers and hospitals in this country in materniaty cases. As we speak, this continues to be charged. They still continue charging the user fees in dispensaries. You cannot purport to say that you will provide free maternity services yet in some health centers there is not even a semblance of health personnel to provide those services. So, the idea here is that if we are going to match our words with our actions, then the movement must start from this House. We must start ensuring that the right thing is done in that sector. You will remember that when Mr. Macharia was being presented as the Cabinet Secretary for Health, there was hue and cry from doctors that he was not a doctor, was not qualified. But I am happy that this individual has taken over a Ministry and from what I have heard and seen, I think he might be the right person, because what is ailing this sector is serious management. It is not about a doctor running the sector; it is about having the capacity to do so, managing the resources required to run that sector in the right way. That means that we must mobilize all resources; the financial, human, infrastructural or physical to make sure that this sector moves forward. As I move this Motion, we must, as a House, ensure that whatever Motions we pass, whatever decisions we make have a mechanism for ensuring that they are implemented. This House should not be making decisions in vain. This is not a baraza, or a high school debating club. It is"
}