adminShamiso Yikoniko
Harare Central Hospital – one of the country’s biggest referral health institutions – is in dire straits as it is grappling with financial woes, a situation that is worsening the facility’s already dilapidated state. Apart from the financial crisis, the institution that is always riddled with water woes, has been forced to abort some surgical operations due to a critical shortage of painkillers.
Just a week after suspending surgeries, the institution is reported to be asking patients to purchase their own painkillers such as paracetamol. As for the water crisis, the renal unit, maternity wards, the paediatric section, X-ray section, theatres, toilets and the laundry section have been the hardest hit.
Leaking roofs, peeling floors and cracked walls characterise the shambolic state of the hospital. This kind of environment makes the hospital a safe haven for all sorts of bacteria. Efforts to get a comment from the hospital’s chief executive officer, Ms Peggy Zvavamwe, on the problems facing the hospital, proved futile as she would not comment.
Emailed questions had not been responded to by the time of going to print. Public hospitals receive funding from Government, which is then complemented by collections made internally, which is usually inadequate.
The central hospital is facing financial challenges and is saddled with an accumulative debt, which at the last reported reconcialition, was $22 million. The debt has accummulated since 2009 when the country adopted multiple currencies. lt is reported that many patients are evading payment by giving false residential addresses or not co-operating during follow-up revenue collections.
Hospital officials say that the outstanding debt is making it difficult for the referral hospital to provide some basic services. The Government hospital, which serves hundreds of patients on a daily basis – mostly from the low-income bracket – is stuck between providing services to the poorest section of the population and enforcing a follow-up strategy on defaulting patients.
According to the Public Health Act, no-one is supposed to be turned away when they visit a public health centre to seek services due to non-payment. The Sunday Mail Extra understands that although the hospital has devised ways of recovering debts by engaging debt collectors, not much is being recovered.
To add to these woes, many patients are by-passing the referral system, going straight to Harare Central Hospital under the illusion that services at the institution are free of charge. This has resulted in the hospital making headlines countless times, usually for running out of drugs.
Earlier this year, Ms Zvavamwe was placed under investigation by the Ministry of Health and Child Care after she allegedly ordered the hospital’s finance department to stop all other procurements until they raised $88 359 required for the purchase of her official Jeep Cherokee.
Although the purchase of the Jeep Cherokee was in line with her conditions of service, the order came at a time when the institution was struggling to provide even pain-killers to its patients.
Added to the financial difficulties being faced by the hospital, water has been scarce at the hospital, with the institution going for days without the precious resource. During the few days that water is available at the institution, the pressure is usually so low that it does not reach the third floor wards.
Therefore the hospital is looking forward to improve the water supply with the completion of a water reservoir that has a 2,5 million-litre capacity. At least $800 000 is required to renew the dilapidated water system.
Speaking to this publication last year, Ms Zvavamwe promised that the dilapidated state of the hospital would soon be a thing of the past as they had commenced renovations in the hospital’s wards. Back then, the estimates of renovating a single ward with vinyl sheeting for the floors, to prevent bacterial and fungal growth, was put at at least $30 000.
A number of churches and organisations have adopted certain wards to ease the financial burden at the health institution.
These include Celebration Health, Methodist Church, Seventh Day Adventist, Impala Motors and Stanbic Bank, among others. The hospital was officially opened in 1958 after having been built in 1945 with a bed occupancy of 630 patients. lt has grown to be one of the largest referral centres in the country but is now operating below capacity due to financial constraints.
HCH has grown to accommodate 1 200 maternal, paediatric, psychiatric and medicinal patients’ beds. The meagre funds that the hospital gets from central Government is also used to cater for the needs of groups exempted from paying hospital fees, such as children under five years of age, senior citizens (those over 65 years) and those in the psychiatric unit.
The hospital, which recently received 600 beds from Government, acquired as part of the $100 million Chinese loan, meant to procure medical devices ranging from basic hospital beds to sophisticated magnetic resonance imaging machines, has been aspiring to expand its mortuary since 2005 at a cost of at least $1,5 million.
The new mortuary is anticipated to have a holding capacity of at least 208 corpses after completion, compared to the 146-corpse holding capacity of the old mortuary. However, the incomplete mortuary now has trees growing inside. The hospital’s maintenance team occasionally cuts them down. Then there is the issue of inadequate staff accommodation.
At one point, the hospital tabled plans to engage investors to build apartments on a build-operate-transfer arrangement where the funder would build, own and let out accommodation to the hospital for a certain period of time to recover their costs. Thereafter, the funder would hand over the apartments to the hospital.
Online Reporter