Time To Turn Around Health System

I WOULD like to express my disappointment not only to the Government, but also to ourselves that we could let our hospitals deteriorate in such a manner.

Not just that, but that it took us 17 years to break down our health system. My mother was a nurse in the early seventies.She told me that back then, the nurses would let all the patients leave their wards and go out onto the lovely green grass that used to be there.They would then clean the wards so well that a cockroach would not even dare to run across those clean floors; the walls would have no filth marks on them and the windows were so clean, one would think they were open.And did I mention that the nurses did the cleaning themselves, which means there were no cleaners.Now that also included bathing the patients, feeding them, and giving them the love and care a patient needed.That is only fair.So what went wrong? I have seen with my own eyes how the cleaners at the hospitals/clinics, clean the floors.They simply wet the mop then ‘drag’ it across the floor, dry it then ‘drag’ it again.Now if you did that in my mother’s home, she would give you a good slap.I have never known a floor to be cleaned in that way.The walls are filthy, but I bet you if you take a cloth with a little detergent, and wipe, the filth would come right off.But there seems to be a lack of know-how regarding cleanliness in our hospitals/clinics.Then there are mice and cockroaches doing the rounds across the hospital floors.Has anybody been to a Namibian hospital/clinic and not seen them? What is more, I am sure that when the doctors and nurses took oaths, they promised to do their best to take care of the sick.Where there is dirt there must be germs, so what happens when you treat someone in a dirty place? Do you then expect them to become well? Then we expect to have a healthy nation.When our babies are born healthy but get sick because of the germs that greet them when they take their first breath of life? Then there is the other matter of medicine.When you have the flu, stomach pain, or a big sore on your foot, you get Panado, which is a headache tablet.There is no way you can cure patients without the correct medication, and that is a fact known by all.I have never seen a health care facility that allows all their staff to go on lunch, while you have sick people in pain having to wait until the nurses finish having their lunch, then take another 30 minutes to get back to their posts.What, don’t they have respect for the sick anymore? Things have to change and now is the time.Just like the nation supported the nurses when they were negotiating their salary increase, the nurses must now prove to the nation that they are worth that increase.The nation has to strongly speak out against anything that is wrong in our country and our leaders have to listen to us with both ears.Even though this is not the first time that the nation is crying about the situations at the hospitals/clinics, let this be the last.There is no way we can be a healthy nation when we don’t have the best heath facilities.Afra Kavandje Via e-mailMy mother was a nurse in the early seventies.She told me that back then, the nurses would let all the patients leave their wards and go out onto the lovely green grass that used to be there.They would then clean the wards so well that a cockroach would not even dare to run across those clean floors; the walls would have no filth marks on them and the windows were so clean, one would think they were open.And did I mention that the nurses did the cleaning themselves, which means there were no cleaners.Now that also included bathing the patients, feeding them, and giving them the love and care a patient needed.That is only fair.So what went wrong? I have seen with my own eyes how the cleaners at the hospitals/clinics, clean the floors.They simply wet the mop then ‘drag’ it across the floor, dry it then ‘drag’ it again.Now if you did that in my mother’s home, she would give you a good slap.I have never known a floor to be cleaned in that way.The walls are filthy, but I bet you if you take a cloth with a little detergent, and wipe, the filth would come right off.But there seems to be a lack of know-how regarding cleanliness in our hospitals/clinics.Then there are mice and cockroaches doing the rounds across the hospital floors.Has anybody been to a Namibian hospital/clinic and not seen them? What is more, I am sure that when the doctors and nurses took oaths, they promised to do their best to take care of the sick.Where there is dirt there must be germs, so what happens when you treat someone in a dirty place? Do you then expect them to become well? Then we expect to have a healthy nation.When our babies are born healthy but get sick because of the germs that greet them when they take their first breath of life? Then there is the other matter of medicine.When you have the flu, stomach pain, or a big sore on your foot, you get Panado, which is a headache tablet.There is no way you can cure patients without the correct medication, and that is a fact known by all.I have never seen a health care facility that allows all their staff to go on lunch, while you have sick people in pain having to wait until the nurses finish having their lunch, then take another 30 minutes to get back to their posts.What, don’t they have respect for the sick anymore? Things have to change and now is the time.Just like the nation supported the nurses when they were negotiating their salary increase, the nurses must now prove to the nation that they are worth that increase.The nation has to strongly speak out against anything that is wrong in our country and our leaders have to listen to us with both ears.Even though this is not the first time that the nation is crying about the situations at the hospitals/clinics, let this be the last.There is no way we can be a healthy nation when we don’t have the best heath facilities.Afra Kavandje Via e-mail