The aggrieved Medical and House Officers attached to the Ministry of
Health and Sanitation, yesterday decided to suspend their laying down
tools action based on humanitarian grounds, as their role is to save the
lives of fellow human beings according to a press release issued.
The
release states that the strike action was a unanimous decision by the
Medical and House Officers attached to MOHS to restore the dignity of
their noble profession and to avoid the recurrence of the incident that
took place on December 9th 2013.
There claim is that the alleged
incident which was between their medical colleague and the Minister of
Health and Sanitation, Miatta Kargbo, will set a bad precedent.
They
added that it was not a plot or any design to kick the Minister out of
her office neither was it politically motivated as stated in various
newspapers which went on to mention some of their colleagues by name.
According
to the release, the Minister on the said date barged into the out
patient at Connaught hospital and demanded Dr. Murray to see a patient,
when the Doctor was examining a patient who was critically ill. The
Doctor however, told the Minister that she had already attended and
referred the patient in question to the Princess Christian Maternity
Hospital (PCMH) as she was pregnant. It is alleged that the Minister
insisted that the Doctor must see the patient again, which according to
them is unethical as the privacy of both patients was not taken into
consideration, and that the Doctor continued to examine the critically
ill patient which did not go down well with the Minister who went
ballistic on the Doctor, raining abuses at her person which attracted a
crowd demoralizing the Doctor and the profession.
As a result of
this fracas, the Minister instructed the Hospital Management present at
the scene to remove the Doctor from the Outpatient department at
Connaught, which is not in line with the Civil Service Code of conduct
as assignment of Medical Doctors is done by the Chief Medical Officer
and not by the Minister. According to the release, this is not the first
time the Minister has brought the integrity of the profession to
disrepute and if such acts are not discouraged now, the mindset of
Doctors performance will be disrupted which will change the psyche in
meeting with their professional demands as they need protection from
their supervising Ministry.
“In order to attract the attention of
the supervising Ministry, and particularly the President of this
republic on this issue, we decided to use the only option available to
us to lay down our tools. A letter was sent to President Ernest Bai
Koroma to reinstate our colleague,” it states, adding that even though
series of consultations were held, there requests were not met, but they
have decided to suspend their laying down tools on humanitarian
grounds.
Addressing the issue of forged signatures of the Doctors
who were not in town at the time of signing a list of aggrieved Medical
and House Officers, they stated that they did not forge any signature as
Doctors absent scanned their signatures and gave their consent to be
among the list.
Miatta Kargbo
Reacting to the
allegation by Dr Murray, Health Minister Miatta Kargbo said when
President Koroma told her that Tony Blair was coming to Town and he will
be visiting the Connaught hospital, she instructed the officials at the
hospital to make sure it is clean and well kept.
She said last
Sunday afternoon, she went to check whether they have cleaned the
hospital, but to her shock, the hospital was not cleaned. She had to
mobilise the cleaners and other workers whom she paid to make sure they
clean the hospital.
Past Monday, she said she was in the company
of Tony Blair and Dr T.B. Kamara when a nurse reported to Dr Murray that
they have brought in a critically ill patient that needs immediate
attention. She said Dr Murray was called in to take care of the patient,
but she insisted they should take the patient to her office.
The
Minister said she prevailed on her to check the patient but she refused.
Dr T.B. Kamara and Dr Taqi were the ones who stabilized the woman
before she was taken to Cottage for onward treatment”, the minister
said.
Minister Miatta Kargbo said she believes that Dr Murray did
not know who she was and that when she called on the senior doctors that
were with her Chief Medical Officer Dr Brima Kargbo, Dr Taqi and Dr
T.B. Kamara and asked them to take action, they decided to transfer her
from Connaught because she is unable to stand the tension at Connaught
hospital.
She said when she was instructing Dr Murray to
immediately treat the woman Dr T.B. Kamara was there and he will testify
if she is lying. She said since she took over that Ministry and has
been trying to bring sanity, she has always been treated unfairly
because they want her out of the ministry.
Miatta Kargbo said,
since the Integrated Project Management Unit was approved by the
President with her advice, she has been in the bad books of so many
health workers. She said this unit controls every funding coming in the
health sector. “In the past individuals source their funding without the
knowledge of the ministry and the donor agencies were frowning on that.
We had to put this unit together so that we can harmonise all monies
coming in the ministry.”
“It was this free funding that made the
government to repay about Le500 million of the Gavi funds that was
misappropriated. Now every penny connected with the Health ministry
comes through this unit and I have been commended by the donors for
bringing sanity into the Health funding programmes.”
Miatta Kargbo
said she can’t understand why people don’t want to accept change. She
said the strike action is beyond what happened between Dr Murray and her
as other people have hijacked the strike to get her out of office so
they can return to their old ways.
The Minister gave this
interview over the telephone from Switzerland, where she had been asked
by the World Bank to share her experiences with other developing
countries on how she has been able to combat corruption in the health
sector in Sierra Leone.
She added that the Pharmaceutical
Procurement Unit is now functional and it is being run by the Department
for International Department (DfID) officials in a bid to combat fake
drugs. She said 15 years ago the SLPP government started it but the
pressure they faced they never succeeded. She said Mrs Zainab Bangura
too tried but had the same result, “Now I have succeeded and today
nobody can bring in drugs into the country without the approval of the
unit.” This she said has helped to combat fake drugs in the country.
“All these changes are what have made me an enemy in the health sector”.
Miatta Kargbo said she will be back to continue her work and bring in more sanity in the sector.
source : http://awoko.org
06:00
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