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{
    "id": 528279,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/528279/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 322,
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    "speaker": null,
    "content": "enjoying the benefits of devolution in the health sector in those lower levels but there is a real challenge in Level Five hospitals. Madam Temporary Speaker, this Motion is very important because I know there is a push in the Senate for us to have referral hospitals in every county, even in the counties where the Level Five hospitals do not exist today. We expect that in the next few years, there are going to be at least 47 county Level Five hospitals in all the counties. The challenge we are going to face is the retention of qualified specialists in those counties. We are already experiencing this problem. There are some counties where we do not have enough indigenous specialists and we have to rely on other counties. It is not that sometimes we do not have those specialists, but of course, we know the specialists are concentrated in one county called Nairobi; at the Kenyatta National Hospital, Aga Khan Hospital, Nairobi Hospital and other hospitals. If you go to other areas like Mandera and Turkana, the specialist there will be a clinical officer. There is a similar story in the outlying districts. It is going to be a real challenge unless we have a policy which will ensure that we recruit and retain specialists of various kinds in those other counties. I think this is what this Motion is trying to address. Madam Temporary Speaker, this is not just a matter for the counties, it is a matter which requires cooperation between the national Government and the county governments. Were it not for other issues which will be offending the Constitution, maybe what we would have for doctors is a board equivalent to the Teachers Service Commission (TSC) where it is in control of the teachers and it is able to post them everywhere in the country. It does not matter where a teacher comes from, he or she can serve in other counties. If we had a body which was controlling doctors like that, so that a doctor gets a letter posting him to Lodwar or Garissa, he has no choice because he has signed the contract and agreed that he is going to serve in any county in the Republic of Kenya---. Maybe that way, we could to make sure that there is equitable distribution of this resource because these doctors do not make themselves; they have been trained by professionals using facilities that have been funded by Kenyans. The doctors’ training in the medical school is funded by Kenyans and, therefore, Kenyans should benefit from that investment. We should have a mechanism for determining where that doctor whom we have invested in goes to work. It is very unfortunate that any person with a little money now does not die in Kenya. They are dying in South Africa, India, the United States of America and other places. I think time has come for Kenya to build facilities of excellence in terms of diagnosis and treatment in this country. I know when our friend, Sen. (Prof.) Anyang’- Nyong’o, was the Minister for Health, he came up with a very good proposal and they said that they had money from the National Hospital Insurance Fund (NHIF) to put up a world class facility; a centre of excellence in some land in Karen which would cut all these trips people are making to external countries because even where we do not have the topnotch world class experts, they could bring those experts to our facility here, get the operations done and then the experts can go back home. It will be cheaper. What is making this treatment abroad expensive is not only the patient you are taking the hospital, but you are taking the patient, a relative and sometimes a local doctor. This is a minimum of three people and sometimes they are going to stay there for three months. The electronic version of the Senate Hansard Report is for information purposes only. A certified version of this Report can be obtained from the Hansard Editor, Senate"
}