EXPECTANT mothers are feeling the full brunt of a capital city nurse shutdown which has seen midwives not reporting for night duty, plunging Zimbabwe’s health delivery system deeper into crisis.
This comes after nurses at all council clinics in Harare downed tools last week citing incapacitation.
The development leaves more patients stranded with no alternative care amid an on-going industrial action at central hospitals.
Harare City Council (HCC) has had to scale down operations such that “instead of 12 polyclinics operating 24 hours we are only running six on 24 hour basis.”
“Council is actively engaging the representatives of striking nurses to find each other,” HCC said on Thursday statement.
“The city wants all its health institutions to resume operations and deliver services to the people. At the moment we are operating with skeletal staff ranging between 40 and 44 per day which is almost 30 percent of required staff per day.“
Most affected areas are maternity and outpatients for chronic cases, HCC said.
“The worst time is at night because most midwives are not reporting for night duty. we have had to scale down such that instead of 12 polyclinics operating 24 hours we are only running six on 24 hour basis,” council said.
“We have moved admissions to Beatrice Road because (of) no night nurses at Wilkins. We are still talking to the leadership of the nurses to find each other so that we resume serving the people of Harare,” HCC added.
Zimbabwe’s health system is at its lowest ebb after the country’s Health Service Board discharged hundreds of doctors for absenting themselves from duty without leave or reasonable cause for days ranging from five or more.
The doctors downed tools over two months ago demanding the pegging of their salaries to the prevailing interbank rate as a precondition for their return to work.
The doctors are also demanding that government capacitates hospitals with basic health services to enable them to save lives.
A total 516 out of 1,601 medical doctors employed in the public sector are expected to appear before the disciplinary tribunals.
Doctors have said they want to go back to work, but were without the means to do so.
“On September 3, 2019, doctors nationwide made it clear that they were not embarking on a strike but that they had become incapacitated. The will and desire is there, but the means to execute their duties does not exist,” ZHDA is on record as saying.
