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{
    "id": 799964,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/799964/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 28,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Sen. Murkomen",
    "speaker_title": "The Senate Majority Leader",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 440,
        "legal_name": "Onesimus Kipchumba Murkomen",
        "slug": "kipchumba-murkomen"
    },
    "content": " Mr. Speaker, Sir, before I became a Senator, I used to be a consultant on matters devolution. One of my widely read papers in the health sector is devolution of health. In that paper, I enumerated some of the challenges that come with devolution of health. One important challenge pointed out is the definition of what a referral hospital is. Schedule Four of the Constitution states that all hospitals except referral hospitals are county institutions. The reason why Gov. Mandago is making that petition is because we have failed as Parliament to enact the Health Act in a manner that responds to the challenges that come with a devolved system of Government. Therefore, if we want to answer conclusively the issue of referral hospitals, county referral hospitals, national referral hospitals, how hospitals will graduate from a county referral hospital to a national referral hospital and what are the obligations that will ensue for county and national government, we must enact the Health Act. The reason why the Health Bill is still pending in Parliament is because we cannot agree on various issues that are related responsibilities of national Government and the responsibilities of counties in so far as health is concerned, and to what extent they can support each other. If you look at the whole region of North Rift, there is no single Level Five Hospital. It is justifiable on the part of the Governor of Uasin Gishu to move this hospital to Level Five; reason being that it should receive certain level of support from the national Government like it does at the moment. All the other level five hospitals are entitled to this, in so far as a certain amount of money going as a conditional grant; but the permanent answer to the issue of health lies in how we navigate the issues that are related to devolution of health in the Health Act. This is so because even doctors up to now are still desirous of having a national health institution that deals with matters of human resource. Mr. Speaker, Sir, you may ask yourself; at the moment, if we go by the legal regime that is existing, if a doctor employed in Tana River gets married in Kakamega and wants to move to Kakamega, there is no legal framework of such persons moving from Tana River as an employee of the County Government of Tana River to be absorbed on certain terms in another county. Those are human resource related issues that are giving a lot of challenges to the health sector. 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"
}