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Rumbidzayi Zinyuke Senior Health Reporter
Covid-19 brought untold suffering across the world, killing nearly seven million people, with 5 712 of those deaths recorded in Zimbabwe.
But the interventions implemented by the Government to combat the pandemic, and keep the death toll far lower than it could have been, have helped to strengthen the country’s health systems for improved access to health care for all.
Health facilities across the country benefited from the US$6,6 million Zimbabwe Covid-19 Emergency Response Plan, which supported the deployment and management of vaccines as well as strengthening capacity for health centres to deal with infections such as the Covid-19.
The project, which was co-financed by the Government and World Bank, is being implemented by the Catholic Organisation for Relief Aid (Cordaid) in partnership with the Ministry of Health and Child Care and will run until August this year.
Although Covid-19 has ceased to be classified as a public health emergency, interventions implemented under the project are expected to continue positively impacting on health service delivery within health facilities.
Under the project, Murehwa District Hospital received funds for the installation of a new oxygen reticulation system, which has seen the facility adopting the use of piped oxygen instead of using tanks.
Murehwa District Medical Officer, Dr Tendai Taruvona, said the system would benefit not only the Covid-19 isolation unit but all wards at the hospital.
“Work is ongoing to install the oxygen tanks outside the hospital which will be connected to the pipes that take oxygen directly to the patients’ beds. This is less time consuming for when we have a critical patient we do not need to carry the tanks into the wards but we can immediately supply the needed oxygen to the patient. It also reduces accidents associated with carrying the big tanks.”
The oxygen supply system is expected to cover the maternity, labour, operating theatre, general wards, outpatient and emergency rooms.
Dr Taruvona said the female and paediatric ward was already using the piped oxygen while other wards would be connected soon.
At the peak of the Covid-19 pandemic, isolation units became a major strategy for preventing virus transmission within hospitals.
The emergency response also supported renovation of isolation centres at hospitals which will continue to be used as part of the infection prevention and control initiative.
Mutawatawa District Hospital received about US$20 000 which has been used to repair the isolation unit and install new equipment.
“We have ongoing renovations at Mutawatawa isolation centre and the funds have been used to buy equipment and cleaning material to enhance infection prevention control so that health workers are also safe as they deliver care,” Mashonaland East provincial medical director, Dr Paul Matsvimbo said.
Capacity building was also part of the programme which saw all health personnel in institutions receive training on infection prevention and control, data management and commodity tracking.
Manicaland Provincial Medical Director Dr Munyaradzi Mukuzunga said the training of health workers played a major role in the management of new infectious diseases such as Covid-19.
“We had capacity building of our health care workers across board from the general hands to the specialists depending on the area of specialisation. Obviously infection prevention control and prevention have been the key element both in community and facility so that training has gone a long way in capacitating our people,” he said.
The emergency response sought to push the development, training, and facilitation of community-led responses to increase uptake of public health measures, including Covid-19 vaccination.
This included interpersonal communication at community level through awareness campaigns.
Of note was the training for village health workers in terms of disease surveillance where they did home visits to identify Covid-19 cases and do contact tracing.
Dr Mukuzunga said the village health workers had played a key role in educating communities on Covid-19 vaccines and other infectious diseases.
“One of the key elements was the village health workers. Initially when we started the response in terms of surveillance. We would go to a house test and do contact tracing. But as the numbers increased, that became a mammoth task to do, so we capacitated village health workers who were now doing contact tracing and would then alert the Environmental Health Technicians to go and do the testing. Even for those who were isolated at home, village home workers would assist in assessing the homestead for isolation as well as monitoring them,” he said.
He said the programme had also adopted a multi-sectoral approach which included traditional leaders and community health workers to drive the Covid-19 vaccination.
Manicaland has one of the country’s highest vaccination rates with all districts above 70 percent in terms of the first dose uptake.
Online Reporter