12 Feb 2014

The Ministry of Health will buy 21 new ambulances in the next financial year and distribute them to hospitals and clinics throughout Botswana.

The assistant minister, Dr Gloria Somolekae, said this was to curb the shortage that had been a matter of concern for patients. She was responding to residents’ concerns and complaints during a kgotla meeting in Matsiloje on February 11.

The residents said their ambulance, which was boarded, had since been replaced with an old one, which always went for repairs where it would spend days to the detriment of patients.

Dr Somolekae said the ministry would give priority to areas that did not have an ambulance or the vehicle being in a state of disrepair. She said maintenance and servicing would also be done at private garages, not only at the Central Transport Organisation as it had been the case.

This arrangement, she explained, was meant to address the situation in which the vehicles would spend a long time before they could be attended to, hence causing a transport shortage, which affected service delivery.

She added that her ministry would engage private transporters to distribute drugs to health facilities. This arrangement, she explained, sought to address situations where patients were told to look for medications elsewhere because it was not available in their clinic.

Dr Somolekae said more laboratories would be established around the country so that medical examinations could take place in different places instead of  Gaborone only. This, she said, would solve the problem of delayed results that often took more than a year. The set-up would also reduce loss of results, which led to delayed treatment for patients.

Matsiloje residents said they appreciated government’s HIV and AIDS outreach programme, which had since started in their village. Mr Joseph Mmusi, the chairperson of the Village Development Committee, said the programme helped not only the people of Matsiloje but also of the surrounding areas.

He said they did not have proper roads hence shortage of transport, which resulted in some people defaulting on their treatment due to such situations.

Mr Mmusi requested the ministry to consider turning the village clinic into a 24-hour service facility because it acted as centre for all the villages that were a distance from Francistown, more so that it had a maternity wing. He also asked for a resident doctor in Matsiloje. ENDS