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"id": 915716,
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"type": "speech",
"speaker_name": "Endebess, JP",
"speaker_title": "Hon. (Dr.) Robert Pukose",
"speaker": {
"id": 1458,
"legal_name": "Robert Pukose",
"slug": "robert-pukose"
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"content": " Thank you, Hon. Temporary Deputy Speaker. First, I thank the Departmental Committee on Health led by Hon. Sabina Chege for having visited the four hospitals namely, KNH, MTRH, the National Spinal Injury Referral Hospital (NSIRH) and the Mathari National Teaching and Referral Hospital. As put in the Report, a few months ago, they presented a Report on the Kenyatta University Teaching and Referral Hospital. In their Report, in as far as the NSIRH is concerned, they have only indicated that they have a small piece of land, but they have not indicated the acreage of the land. The Committee should have gone further to establish whether the acreage of land for NSIRH is what the hospital is occupying or people have grabbed it. If people have encroached into the land owned by the NSIRH, then, we should have the NLC repossessing that land. It is the same case with Mathari National Teaching and Referral Hospital, which is in a bad state both in terms of infrastructure and housing. Apart from the Maximum Security Unit, if you go to the other wards where patients are held, during the rainy season, some of the houses are leaking. Unfortunately, they visited the place when there were no rains. Mental patients held in that hospital might not complain and talk about the irritating conditions within the hospital. However, it is our responsibility, more so the Committee, to have gone even further to get the physical outlook of it. The Committee should have looked at how the infrastructure at the hospital could be developed. If you go to Mathari National Teaching and Referral Hospital, you will realise that it is a shame. Our mental patients are in a very bad situation. The land for Mathari National Teaching and Referral Hospital has been encroached by the neighbouring community, and that needs a quick solution by the NLC and the various ministries. Some patients are held for long periods at Mathari National Teaching and Referral Hospital from prisons and the police. These patients do not pay any bills. I think the Ministry of Interior and Coordination of National Government should have a budgetary allocation that should take care of the Mathari National Teaching and Referral Hospital, so that as they keep the patients there for a very long time, they are catered for in terms of the basics and essentials like drugs, food and accommodation. They require to be treated well. There is also a problem in our courts with regard to discharging patients who have healed, but overstayed in the hospital. They need to be discharged so that they can go back to the society. You know mental patients undergo many processes. As you heard recently, one of my constituents, who is now being treated at KNH, is a case of schizophrenia. Even KNH does not have a proper ward for holding mental patients. All the mental patients at KNH are held with other patients within the ward. I spoke to the Deputy Director about this matter. The way KNH is structured, it has no place for holding mental patients. We have a patient who has schizophrenia, a student at the Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture and Technology (JKUAT who attempted to climb the State House wall. I want to condemn the police. How does somebody who has a kitchen knife approaching a trained security officer get shot? Why did they have to shoot him in order to disarm him? If, indeed, you are a properly trained officer, you should arrest and disarm a young man with a knife. With a kitchen knife, he The electronic version of the Official Hansard Report is for information purposes only. Acertified version of this Report can be obtained from the Hansard Editor."
}