Government has disclosed that technical experts are scrutinizing the feasibility of establishing mobile hospitals in all the nine provinces of the country.
Chief Government Spokesperson Ronnie Shikapwasha explained that the idea of establishing mobile hospitals in the country is a suggestion that is still being processed by the relevant authorities.
Lt. Gen Shikapwasha who is also Information and Broadcasting Services Minister said in Lusaka today that government will only decide on the matter once the technocrats determine the feasibility of the initiative.
He also said that government will decide whether mobile hospitals are feasible or not based on the findings of the technical team that is looking into the issue.
Lt. Gen Shikapwasha said the nation will be informed in due course as soon as the evaluation is successfully completed.
He said government will also endeavor revamping rural roads around the country if the initiative is approved.
Lt. Gen Shikapwasha’s was responding to some media reports that government is in the process of acquiring a US $53 million loan for EX-IM Bank of China to facilitate the acquisition of the mobile hospitals from a Chinese firm called China National Aero-Technology Import and Export Corporation (CATIC).
ZANIS/CM/AM/ENDS
You should have consulted stakeholders like the Medical Association of Zambia, Health Boards and others before going on with intentions of signing the loan. The fact that this stage was reached suggests this was a done deal. The idea may not necessarily be a bad one but is it good for Zambia? Please ba Government learn to consult before going into some of these ventures. You have nothing to lose but everything to gain. Knowledge has no boundaries.
Viva the Post for digging deeper on this scam! so its true, how shocking, barely weeks after a tribunal completed its work regarding another single sourced contract for zamtel! How on earth do you conduct a feasibility study for something after you have signed the contract to procure the mobile hospitals? Trying to legitmise an illegality as was the case with RP Capital!
Am not for this idea coz monies will be stolen thru this system. imagine today u hav this moblie clinic here 2 weeks later the move to another place chaps will be paid allowances to move with the mobile clinic corruption will be will surface for pipo to move with the said clinics. Why not part of money is pumped into Flying doctors services and improve on our local clinics may be build some more structures wer we can.
Was any contract signed, ??
The Farmers are crying out for Roads. If the roads will be improved, why not provide transpost to the hostitals that already exist in every district ? $53M is a lot of money. Who is getting oiled for signing this deal ?
This issue of Mobile clinics will bring more problems, i will wait for the Medical Association of Zambia and Other Health Boards
This is another man that nauseates me.
Mobile hospitals are a great way of reaching people who cant get to hospitals. These would be particularly useful geared towards Maternity, pediatric and Dental health.
How susstainable are these mobile hospitals/ we need real hospitals!
We are neither gypsies nor nomads. Govt knows were our people are. Misplaced priorities indeed. How about rounding up the street kids and giving them a life from that money? or better still, how about procuring the much needed, medical equipment in our ill equipped existing hospitals. We shall lessen the dependency on SA hospitals and evacuation expenses. Cabinet think with your heads.
Otherwise i suspect henry (RBB’s sons) and his brother are behind this deal. Is that why Teta and mulongoti are now behind Govnt procurement?
Had it not been donors threatening to withhold money meant for Ministry of Health, these crooks would have pushed us into deep trouble with another unnecessary loan. Do these MMD chaps think Zambians are stupid? They do not learn from what is happening to Chiluba? I am shocked to see this type of behaviour from men and women entrusted to manage the affairs of the country. They always want to tell lies to cover more lies, typical thieves.
I think mobile hospitals are a good idea. Rural areas consist of villages mostly that are sparsely situated. To construct a hospital in a single location is surely counter-productive as rural dwellers would have to walk long distances just to receive healthcare.
Mobile hospitals will surely make the rural ares accessible to healthcare and the rural dwellers will surely benefit. No more waking up kuseni seni just to carry an ill person on your back to walk all the way mu town just to treat an illness. Let the hospital come to you.
I am in support of the mobile hospital idea.
As # 7 and 8 point out , whats the use of having things that will breakdown in 2 yrs ? Apart from the liability of the medical equipment, now GRZ must worry about maintaining chinise trucks ?. This sounds good but look deeper and you will see the liabilities outweigh the benifits. GRZ should just improve existing clinics and distric hospitals.
Whoever participated in the initial discussion of acquiring mobile hospitals did not think right. What is needed at the moment are well equiped Health Centers in rural areas. This way not only shall we have services being provided to the needy, but we shall also have employment opportunities for our medical professionals. If you think about it, we have for a long time now been struggling with improvement of the rural roads. We have a long way to go on this one.
i think this guy is a nitwit!
Rubbish .Why not refurbish existing hospitals which are in bad shape.
Another tribunal in offing lm sure someone will be smart this time. Mobile hospitals will be a waste of money as these are not suitable to access our rural areas due to poor road network. Upgrading of existing infrastructure will be more ideal
Ba LT please stop using this picture of Shikapwasha . He looks like a clown and it irritates me.
So it means you have to wait to be sick until you hear the mobile hospital will be in your area. What about the rural health centers? What has happened to them? This trial and error stuff wont solve any problem. Think of your mother or daughter dying with malaria but you cannot do anything because the mobile hospital is not scheduled to be in your area at that point in time. What logic does your leadership have? Doctors without borders do it because we cannot provide treatment at all. In fact their main focus are long term problems like corrective surgeries, TB, Cancers, but such diseases like malaria, high fevers, stomach issues that kill quickly, you need quick intervention. Death does not wait for mobile vans. These guys have run out of ideas. Please get them out quick.
#12. Free Market fimi fimo -Mobile Hospital are a bad ideah. Firstly maintenance costs and operation costs are going to be very high, not to talk of allowances to people who will work in these same mobile hospitals, coz they wont have to be in their homes for plenty times on end. imagine a ZmK285,000 per day for the entire hospital workforce for over 365day/ say 2. Already our health personnel are the most poorly looked after in the sub region with the exception of Congo DR and Zimbabwe. is govt going to manage. the donors are right and as citizens we do not need this. Let them strengthen what we have at UTH and the other Hospitals in the country.
This is not for the Zambian person’s benefit, this is for the people pushing the ideah to benefit.
# 19 . good points. And if Zambia needed mobile vans for corective sugery, it would not need $53 M worth. Just 1 or 2 vans can cover the whole Zambia.
This is just a ploy to steal money by way of commissions. RB you GRZ is begining to stink of corruption. Lets see if he will coment on this.
Mobile Hospitals, Mobile Schools, Mobile Prisons and Mobile Disco’s.. Lets have the whole lot! Some real geni-assess at work! Why bother with economic growth indicators when clearly development not on the agenda!? Lets just get ourselves to the stone age!
This is a very ‘careless and fullish’ (Sp) a strategy…and you should stop now!!!! Zambia’s nine provinces have poor and dilapidated hospital buildings/facilities and this is why you and your cronies in government go abroad for treatment for manageable chronic diseases such as diabbetes. Mobile hospitals are designed to relieve the pressure off the bigger and established hospitals…. unnecessary over crowding! Your focus should be based on modernising the current hospitals, improve the clinics and above all respect the people working in this industry i.e. doctors, nurses and others. After ensuring that these hospitals are done and you feel confindent that you can go there Ron, then think about these mobile hospitals/clinics and use them in the rural areas where they could be…
Continued from #23. where they could be very effective. Hospitals can never be mobile Ronnie but clinics can.!! This idea of mis-using donor funds for projects that are doomed before they even commence is another way of defining corruption. Quit playing with Zambian people and initiate programmes that are sustainable. You are a joke Ronnie, I wish I had a way of wiping that ugly smile off your So..y’ ar..’ face!! MMD For 2011…?
To be honest, mobile night club deserves a good consideration ka. mobile hospital is a no no
I have travelled extensively in the western world, never heard of such crazy ideas. In the UK, they have NHS(national health service) and America has a great healthcare system. This is a lazy way of healthcare delivery to masses who have just known panado from the days of KK.
The idea is good, although i do not think that we have enough logistics and the necessary equipment to sustain such a task….Kwamba kashimani.
Mwebantu, the roads are very bad even for scotch-carts, let alone mobile hospitals. Has anyone of you been on the Dark Forest Road that connects Lukulu with Kabombo via Watopa Pontoon? What about the Bottom Road that is supposed to connect Siavonga with Sinazongwe? KULIBE!
#27 Striper….fair play, the idea is good but the reality with this Government is that they would by all means use this initiative primarily which will later create problems in terms of modernising and sustaining the current hospitals available. I think this will be used as a campaign strategy, considering the fact that MMD is kind of popular in the rural areas. …What do you think, I mean critically really?
If Mohammed cannot go to the mountain, the mountain must come to Mohammed. People are transported to hospitals on ‘mpapeni’ taxi, wheel barrows, Scotch carts etc. Either get ambulances or get hospitals to the patient. Mobile diagnostic imaging and laboratory equipment may also be handy. I support the motion.
#26loggerheads. Wales in the UK is the size of Kafue National park. There are 3 million people there. There are more than 10 Ndola Central Hospital sized hospitals with all the necessary facilities and 3 UTH size hospitals. To build the same number of hopsitals for the whole of Zambia is an impossible task. It is time hospitals had legs to go to the patient. This idea is from China and China is innovative in providing answers to problems that are unique to them. It is time we changed the ‘Bwana’ or ‘Mkuwa’ complex and found local solutions for our people! Western medicine has failed in Africa.
#31 But you cannot jump ship and become mobile when your current strategy interms of service delivery remains questionable!! What guarantee have you based your analysis on? This is Zambia we are talking about. Sort out the current hospitals first and extend the quality service to the hard to reach groups of people. Look at the situation like the ‘rural urban drift and vice versa…one end has to be solidified to prevent a cycle that is purely underpinned by failure. This is a no brainer and you know that it is not viable in the context of our beloved nation. UTH is fairly good a hospital but what about the one in Mongu as seen on BBC or the other State hospitals in other provinces. Its important to clean your back yard before extending your hand…..!!!
First it was the mobile clinics, now its the mobile hospitals…
Hope this one works.. thanks for the idea and who ever thought about this….
#26 Loggerheads, FYI the US has mobile hospitals too. I live in the US and while medical care is good, the health system is not the best. There are many people in the US with no health insurance and cant get medical care when needed.
Mobile hospitals are cheaper than building a whole hosptal or renovating an old building. Pack up some meds and medical people, go to the patients. Doctors without borders does it. This is not a new idea.
The mission statement of the MOH in summary states, provision of equity of access to cost-effective quality health care as close to the family as possible.Formulated in 1991 in the MMD manifesto.What has been achieved so far? what are the constraints so far ?
In my view , there is need to strengthen the existing services before jumping on a known concept/ idea just coined differently. we have mobile clinics already in Zambia
1. Sight saves for eye clinics exist
2. Flying doctors do exist
what we need is improve on the many rural health centers and the existing mobile clinics under govt and mission hospitals .
Zambia should learn from the past and I am glad on this issue it has been left with the MOH. Most solutions should be locally generated , health is very paramount and delicate requires sober thinking . So far the ambulance services in Zambia is non existence, revive this instead of calling it mobile hospitals , strengthen the ambulance services to work with blood bank services of Zambia. Foreign ideas do not work … let us learn from the past
Wonders never cease in Zambia .. mobile clinics in most cases still use the existing infrastructure ,please do acquaint yourselves with this knowledge . These are clinics not hospital as some smart guy has already pointed out in one the above postings . The emphasis and I repeat should be on improving the already existing infrastructure… How strange , so the thought of training of TBAs is hidden here .. let the old bones rest at farms
# 34, Mobile hospitals in the US? Where do you live? Are you in the Appalachian Mountains? The only place where living in Zambia seems better. Wow. Sorry I have to say this, those mobile clinics you see are run by universities and they use them for research and data collection. As you may know some universities need row data to accomplish their analysis hence those mobile vans. The other place is the Appalachian where dentists together with Pepsi Company donate their time and equipment to treat the alleged dental decay because of too much Mountain Dew soda. So, help us. Find out whose vans you are referring to. Hope you’re not talking about ambulances. Because some of them can be big, more those operated by fire fighters.
Wiseman-reborn thanks for your compliment from the other blog. I am not a priest but ndine che guy wa pa easy First of all big up to The Post, when this story appeared in the post some Post critics thought it was not possible this will come up so soon just after we burried Dora. When I defended the post someone called Nkole told me I was a Parrot of Fred Mmembe. Someone called me Rude yeterday coz I dont support such unneccessary expenditures like mobile clinics. This goverment is not transparent, sincere or trustworthy, Why do we have to learn everything through the post. Such things as mobile clinics are not supposed to be secrets. I can imagine how many secrets, corrupt that is have passed without our Knowledge coz the post cant get everything. The question is why was it a secret?
RB and his compatriots are so desperate to make a mark but they dont have the ideas. We have never had mobile clinics in Zambia. So the motive is not to help the Zambian people but to say we worked hard we brought mobile clinics. They want to do it like the way N’kandu Luo left a mark when he painted the Country Blue and White(Buses that is) but they forget that she was so smart that govt never spent nothing on that. You see some of the marks they need to leave dont cost a thing believe me. These mobile clinics will cost us a lot like some clever and sincere people have already mentioned. Just imagine, experts, Support and maintenance, out of town allowances plus more. Shikapwasha, tell your boss to stop it now bring back technocrats you have sent to resorts to disucss this useless…
Do this gov have priorities? Please improve our already existing hospitals and build hospitals in areas were there are no hospitals not these mobile hospitals you want to buy, unless if you people are going to be carrying these things on your heads once you run out of fuel, we know our gov can’t manage to maintain them!!!!
It is very interesting when individuals like Shikapwasha and the Zambian Government start talking big about mobile hospitals (or Mobile Health) professionally defined in Health Informatics as “The use of mobile devices or technology to facilitate or support medical practices”. In short, it is allowing clinicians to have access to patients via video link, emails, telephones, medical devices and also having real-time access to patient/service user records countrywide. I do believe this is too expensive and premature venture for the Zambia Government. What is missing in the Zambian Healthcare is capacity building in some areas and motivation of staff (re brain drain) as well as modern equipment.
And if you are admitted, it means you will be driven around and visitors will have to come locating you everytime they come to visit..lol..i dont think it necessary..build proper hospitals and save on transport and other mobilty costs that will surface
This deal is just another case of fraud by our unprincipled govt. Many of the roads in rural areas are very bad, so where will the so called hospital on wills pass, and for how long will they run? It is a a pathetic deal. May be China has good roads, which many Zambian rural areas lack.
I see nothing wrong with considering nocel ideas, even if we are the first in he world. So what? If we want to improve our health then lets look at alternatatives, as a person not well aquainted with Health management or logistics I am not competent to surport the idea or not. Lets leave to the technocrats to decide and advise our Government. We are all free to comment but Government is also perfectly in order to consider options avaialableno matter how absurd they may sound. When Reagan was president if America they callled his policies Voodoo economics, he is now regarded as a one president who brought great change to the country.
Donor countries had complained against the idea, thats Shikas is trying to web his Gvt out with belated explanations
How will these mobile hospitals operate during the rain season? I remember when we had UBZ, it could only service rural areas in summer from about August to November after the roads had been worked-on. How then will patients be catered-for during the rest of the year?Maybe there is no rain in China, but here it rains big time and most roads and bridges are washed away by heavy rain and small rivers. Nay, this whole idea is ludicrous.
If we want to improve health care delivery particularly in remote areas, we should improve the existing infrastructure and build more clinics and district hospitals. We should also consider adequate renumeration for health care workers and other supporting staff to attract them to work in distant places. This is how it is done elsewhere.
Why should government spend money on Movable assets in the health sector and let the already existing fixed assets remain in ruin?
The delicate equipment in these mobile hospitals will all be damaged by our bumpy, dusty roads even before they reach their destinations. Replacement parts and the technology will need to be maintained by the Chinese, making the whole project parasitic, sucking the little money that will be set aside for health in perpetuity
Hasn’t Government learnt from the Mulungushi Textiles and Tazara stories. Wisen up people.
If this had not been questioned by the media, we would be witnessing a signing ceremony by now. Why didnt the technocrats first look at the deal before asking for the loan? And if the technocrats say no, will we go to EXIM Bank and say ‘our bad, that loan is not necessary after all’? Too much puting the cart before the horse in this govt. That is why you are being attacked every day. RB, show some sense and do things the correct way. We are tired of you messing up. First u increase salaries and then blame your ministers for accepting them, then the GMO maize saga, then Dora and now this. When will it all end? At any work place, this incompetence would be punishable by dismissal. Your CV indicated these amature mistakes should not be the order of the day. Was the CV embelished? Just…
Contd. Just wondering
# 42 Healthline if this was an exam you would have failed. Off the mark
#32 JD #38 Kalos2020 Thanks for the debate. This is exactly what we need. There are pros and cons to every idea. We must understand that everyone is working for the good of the country and may the best idea win. I have worked in the Zambian health service at senior level both for GRZ and ZCCM. Mobile clinics or whatever one calls them are not new. In the 60s we controlled TB by chest xray screening from mobile Xray vans. $53 million may look like a lot of money but it can hadly get you one good size district hospital. One can argue that this money should be used to refurbish and equip existing hospitals, well and good, but this is a loan. Loans should be used for expansion and not for consumption.
Each year hospitals should produce a budget that should take care of running costs. If hospitals become run down, then the managers are responsible for that failure. Health care does not come cheap but inefficiencies and waste are rampant in public hospitals all over the world and worst of all in Zambia where most hospital directors cannot tell their right hand from the left. The Central Board of Health (Katele Kalumba’s) experiment was widely cheered in Southern Africa, but that has flopped. Then, the question of opposition by the Zambia Medical Association is touted in the Post as though binding. ZMA is not equivalent to LAZ. The executive of ZMA are individuals with no legal power to affect health policy. ZMA membership is voluntary and not all inclusive.
For the ZMA opinion to carry weight, it must come out as a resolution passed at the annual general meeting. Even this is not representative of doctors because a great majority of senior doctors in Zambia do not participate in ZMA activities and are not paid up members. The British Medical Association has more clout, but did you know that in 1948 it was opposed to the idea of a National Health Service? Today it is the strongest voice against dismantling of the NHS! So, the point is, doctors are not always right. RB promised to build more hospitals during his campaign and in his speech to Parliament he promised the same. Why didn’t the opposition ask how? Every manifesto must be weighed and costed. When we elect a government on that basis, we should let them govern.
Today one of the best mobile hospital sails the earths high seas delivering sight to the blind all around the world. It is a ship! When I was a medical student in Zambia we used to go to Mwachisompola in Chibombo district for community health projects. I remember one of our colleagues helped to deliver a baby while we were there. Had we not been around that service would not have been availed this lady albeit from just a student! In Mutenda, on the Chingola-Solwezi road we treated dozens of people with urinary bilharzia. These would not go to the hospital or health centre but they came to us when we visited. This is the kind of work that mobile hospitals could be doing. Prevention is better than cure. Tertiary health care is too expensive for poor countries.
It would be more economical to go out into the community and see these patients or well persons before complications or disease afflicted them respectively. A great majority of the diseases that afflict Zambians are preventable and cheap to manage. On the other hand, apart from stroke and heart diseases, the other diseases that are costly to manage tend not to be acute but chronic and could have time to be refferd to a tertiary centre. Maternal and child health and eye patients would be the biggest beneficiaries of a well equiped mobile hospital. I give my vote to the motion.
By the way, it cost $60 million to convert a Danish rail Ferry into a state of the art hospital ship. The ship has 474 berths, a 78-bed ward, six operating theatres, an X-ray room, CT scanner, and a school for up to 60 pupils. These Mercy ships have provided more than $700 million worth of services worldwide since set up in 1978. Mind you, they are run by volunteers! So for those of you who think $53 million is a lot of money, think again. If we can have 19 districts serviced by mobile hospitals at a cost of that much, we will belaughing all the way to health!
Yes I heard you right “The Saint”, $60m to convert a Danish Rail Ferry into a STATE OF THE ART HOSPITAL SHIP. The Stats: 474 Berths, 78-bed ward, 6 Operating Theatres, X-ray Room, CT Scanner and a school for up to 60 pupils.
Questions is: How many Zambian District Hospitals have such facilities and equipment mentioned above in place? How bumpy or dusty is the sea, compared to our roads?? How long would the equipment last on our “smooth” gravel roads? Would it be sensible to acquire a loan and spend it on such a delicate project?
58 Kwathukummawa
I follow your argument but here are the facts. There are 2 CT scanners in Zambia at present. One is in UTH and the other is in Sino-Zam Friendship (formerly Nkana) Hospital in Kitwe. How many Zambians have access to these scanners. Prof. Nkanza runs a good laboratory in Lusaka. How many Zambians have access to this? Say, for example there was a mobile CT scanner which could visit the provinces even once a month, several Zambians in rural areas would have access to the facility without having to worry about transport money to Lusaka and then when they get there to find the scanner has been down for 3 months! I blame hospital managers for the state of our hopsitals. I speak from experience.
The trouble with Zambi today is that we have a President with a slim majority and loathed by the major opinion formers in the country. Any ideas that come from him are ‘poo-poo-ed’ without sensible debate. This is an idea that Zambians must give considerable thought to and should not be swayed by the western donors who want to keep us in a servile state. One criticism I would have about what RB’s govt is doing is their failure to make use of pilot projects. They seem to jump in with both feet and at the deep end of the pool before they have tested the waters.
Building just one (1) more new well equipped modern STATE OF THE ART HOSPITAL and Just one (1) air anbulance helicopter supported by a few reliable ground ambulances would significantly change Zambias health services delivery picture for good. It would be a better loan to get.
We have been through this already. We built UTH remember? “I would contend at all costs both in word and deed as far as I could that we will be better people, braver and less idle, if we believe that one must search for the things one does not know, rather than if we believe that it is not possible to find out what we do not know and that we must not look for it.” – Socrates, Plato’s Meno, 86b
#60 THE SAINT’ …..I have listened to your sound arguments and while I agree with you in most areas, I still think these programmes have stopped because of the same old argument, ‘LACK OF FUNDS’. This issue alone confirms that such programmes for a country like Zambia are not sustainable and the notion of sustainability is one that hinders our nations progress in many sectors that include sport. We as Zambians-Government do not adopted initiatives that best suit our circumstances-that can be sustained. We are always waiting for donor funds to keep particular programmes stay viable. Too much reliance on aid is no way to develop a nation. What sustainable strategies/policies have we in place…probably none going by the things so far….!
Yes “The Saint” We have been through and failed because we failed to properly manage. If the problem was more of mismanagement of resources than the project concept itself, what guarantee would we have then that the mobile hospitals would not face the same fate?
It is for this reason that I feel that the most sensible alternative would be to construct a permanent structure which would expand current capacity, stand the test of time and be there even after the loan funds have dried up. Something people would point at and identify with the RB legacy.
What is required really is to improve and increase (or expand) the capacity of our health delivery system and building one more structure meets that need.
An Indian business delegation has disclosed that it would invest about US$ 3 million to set up a diagnostic centre in Zambia yet we are arguing that $53m is not enough to put up a sensible permanent state of the art hospital. I fail to understand Zambian planners and managers
#65 you me-both bro. I seem to find no critical logism in such utterances!!
The saint so you are one of the old bones … please leave modern medicine to us… accompany Nyama soya to the farm … You come very quietly fearing criticism snakes you are all
It pains me when the old do not think and want to appear wise , I have referred my patients to Nkanza labs , and here some one, with some form of dementia says Zambians can not afford how ironic…. and medical scanning centers coming . Improve the rural centers
wiseman-reborn I am simply debating here and I appreciate JD’s and Kwathukummawa’s comments, which I highly respect. As for yours, I dismiss them with the contempt they deserve.
Kwathukummawa and JD
Thanks once again for your valuable and esteemed contributions. I am suggesting that the concept of mobile clinics or hospitals should be investigated. It may be worthwhile piloting the project. On the present government’s approach, I am however concerned because the Chinese company involved is an Aviation company and I do not understand how it gets involved in supplying mobile hospitals! My feelings are that this is a state security issue and the Zambian government may actually be buying jet fighters instead. Governments all over the world do this all the time, the Americans being the leaders.
I am one of the old guys like perhaps like The Saint. I trained when we had Mr Carruthers (an excellent Surgeon) as Senior Medical Superintendent of UTH! Wow! Those were the days! UTH had everything a hospital of that size could have. Today, in UK I meet so many expatriate doctors who nostalgically recollect their ‘wonderful time’ at UTH! Young people have the disadvantage that they have never been old. We have the advantage that we have been young too! ‘Advice costs nothing, It is the gift of the old. The youth know nothing. They need not be told!’
#71 “Former Zambian” you are very right to miss the UTH of those days when it was very well equipped. Yes, Those were the days! UTH had everything a hospital of that size could have. Today, in UK I meet so many expatriate doctors who nostalgically recollect their ‘wonderful time’ at UTH.
That’s why it would be more sensible to recreate those days we all yearn for with nostalgia, by building just one more UTH of those days, supported by a well coordinated air and ground ambulance service. Not the Mobile “Tunthemba” Hospital crap being thrusted down our throats.
#70 THE SAINT’…Indeed this development should be underpinned by critical qualitative inquiry to iron out the pros/cons. Technically, the idea is not bad but the issues of accountability/transparency and sustainability going by the political culture surrounding the current Government would hinder such a programme from being implemented. A pilot programme would definately yield positive results but then again a strategic approach in relation to short, medium and long term results would see the programme dilute into thin air after the medium term of at least five years if not less. However, my issue relates to the funding of such programmes. A big lesson from the current global financial situation highlights the implications of too much dependence on foreign aid!!
The old bones , am a new bone of medicine … with out brain tangles leading to cognitive function loss.. My field
The saint your an old bone or never worked in Zambia apart from Community Medicine at 6th year and internship and later become an economical refuge ……………….
Wiseman re-born (Psychiatrist)
Thanks for attributing agedness to me. Should I suppose you are in old age Psychiatry (foreign medical graduste’s hope for easy consultant post)? I would not be surprised if you are confusing me with your patients. I will not tell you anything about myself because I am not the subject of this discussion. Tell me what you think about Mobile hospitals.
wiseman reborn
Are you not an economic refugee as well? In fact you are probably a British citizen so you are not a Zambian because Zambia does not admit of dual citizenship. So, join me D.S.S. /J.S and become a former Zambian. You are otherwise in breach of the constitution.
Wiseman re-born (Psychiatrist)
Thanks for attributing agedness to me. Should I suppose you are in old age Psychiatry (foreign medical graduate’s hope for easy consultant post)? I would not be surprised if you are confusing me with your patients. I will not tell you anything about myself because I am not the subject of this discussion. Tell me what you think about Mobile hospitals.
I can see through the Chinese scam. CATIC has been to our agricultural show selling all sorts of equipment. These guys do not have the health of a Zambian at heart. This would be a big deal to sell equipment in the form of vehicles. The thing with vehciles and GRZ is that they usually do no co exist for a long time. Give it a couple of years and the whole thing crumbles. Whereas if it were a genuine health initiative, it would have began with an assessemnt of the gaps in the health objectives stated in the 2030 vision, and the FNDP. The idea should be for the chinese to fill the already identified gaps within the health delivery system. I disagree with those who believ in mobile clincs for rural Zambia for many reasons. It would be a treatise. Zambians its now 45 years since independence!
#79 herbalist’…well said!!