16 Mar 2014

The Assistant Minister of Health, Dr Gloria Somolekae has said the Ministry of Health (MoH) will in the near future refer some of its fleet directly to private garages for mechanical maintenance.

Addressing a kgotla meeting in Lehututu on Friday, March 14, Dr Somolekae indicated that the move to refer MoH fleet to private garages was motivated by the fact that Central Transport Organization (CTO) was at times overloaded with vehicle maintenance requests, hence the backlog.

She admitted that shortage of vehicle in MoH has been a worrying factor for years and the situation was worsened by the time that the ministry fleet had to spend at CTO awaiting maintenance.

“The majority of vehicles would in the past spend so much time at the CTO workshop while the community is struggling to receive services adequately due to shortage of vehicles,” she said.

She highlighted that she remains optimistic that the move to maintain fleet at private garages would ensure prompt response to vehicle break downs, which would in the long run translate to better service delivery.

She further encouraged the community to be directly involved in ensuring that they live a healthy lifestyle and make acquaintance with the District Health Management Team (DHMT). She said that a cohesive working relation between the community and the DHMT would ensure that the community had a clear understanding of services rendered to them, therefore would be a position to give positive feedback.

The DHMT, she said, was keen on giving a platform for transparent consultation between the health institution and the customers, hence the need for direct community involvement in the health sector.

She pleaded with the residents to visit health facilities more frequently and refrain from going for medical checkups only when their health status has deteriorated.

For this reason she said it would enable the medical practitioners to diagnose the illness at its early stages and act appropriately towards recuperating the patient.

Dr Somolekae was responding to a concern by Kgosi Kebapatile Montshiwa of Lehututu, who had complained of shortage of vehicles, particularly ambulances as well as the long duration that vehicle spend at CTO awaiting maintenance.

He explained that the clinic vehicle has been at CTO for past two years. Kgosi Montshiwa also pleaded with the MoH to upgrade Lehututu Health Post to a clinic with a maternity wing.

He said they had long been promised a clinic in 1990, but government has since deferred the project citing shortage of funds due to the economic meltdown.

He said the village health post was built in 1975, therefore it was dilapidated and could not accommodate the local population as it is always crowed.

The facility, he said, was always flooded when it rains and the staff houses also need general maintenance. ENDS