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{
    "id": 444254,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/444254/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 391,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Hon. (Prof.) Nyikal",
    "speaker_title": "",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 434,
        "legal_name": "James Nyikal",
        "slug": "james-nyikal"
    },
    "content": "Hon. Temporary Deputy Speaker, if you look at the training of health personnel, this was not considered. Even their progression within their professions was not considered. There are a lot of complexities of the services that are provided within the health sector. Some were very well organized at the national level. One day you cannot just jump in and break them and say that these are now the functions. Hon. Temporary Deputy Speaker, look at immunization which is a completely well organized structure at the national level. That needs to be very carefully looked into and planned before you transfer that function. For example, the HIV/AIDS and Tuberculosis control programmes are well organized and designed on a national level. They needed to be carefully planned, looked at and decided on when to devolve them. These were not done. Hon. Temporary Deputy Speaker, look at what we call Level 5 hospitals. The reason why we created Level 5 hospitals – I know that because I was there when they were being done – was because these hospitals were serving areas beyond just the provinces that we had at that time and they were big hospitals. Therefore, we felt that they should be supported in a special way so that they cover more than one region. Unfortunately, we took them and decided that this is where they are going to be located. No wonder, we have the problems that we have with them. Let us not blame the Constitution or even devolution. The problem has been poor planning in devolution. I want to repeat, the Council of Governors made a mistake. If you look at donor support, we needed to work carefully on how this will be worked out. We had an overriding health policy that covered everything; regulations and service provision across the country. How were we to split this and put it into various counties? With regard to health law, as of now, the overriding law is the Public Health Act. We are in the process of making the health Bill that will bring standards and regulations in health services. We are still working on a health Bill now. Therefore, the problem is not the Constitution or devolution per se ; the problem is that, as a country we did not sit down to plan the devolution of many services; particularly health services. Even in the area of procurement and standard of drugs, you cannot say that everybody is going to walk to any place tomorrow and buy any drugs. What are the quality control systems that are in place? I have noticed that the red light is on, but I want to say that what we need to do is not just reversal but put in place a taskforce to plan health services properly under Article 187 of the Constitution. It provides that taking into consideration what has now happened in the counties. Unless we do that----"
}