The Martyrs of Uganda Health Centre, a facility run by the Navrongo-Bolgatanga Catholic Diocese in the Kassena-Nankana West District, has spent more than Gh¢89,210 on a doctor while the same facility is struggling to get drugs and other consumables like gloves and malaria test kits to offer effective healthcare services to patients.
The amountis an accumulation of the monthly salary the doctor has received since June 2022. Word News investigations revealed that the doctor (name withheld) is on locum and doubles as an acting manager of the facility.
The facility serves at least 9,000 people in Sirigu, where it is located, as well as several other communities like Kandiga, Mirigu, Nabango, Mayoro Yua, parts of Zorkor in the Bongo District as well as some communities in neighbouring Burkina Faso.
The healthcare does not have conducive wards for admission. As a result of the lack, the verandas of the facility have been converted into wards. Its labour is also without a theatre.
Speaking exclusively to Word News, some of the residents of Sirigu lamented how the facility, which they said used to save lives in the past, had turned into a nightmare to them.
Alimatu Issah, a resident, said the facility had good human relations but lacked even drugs like paracetamol, drips, gloves malaria test kids, malaria drugs”. She said patients and their relatives often travelled to the district capital, Paga, or the regional capital, Bolgatanga, to buy drugs for lack of drugs at the facility. She said she lost a relation at the facility because of delay as her family were searching for drugs far away from the facility.
“I’m a BP patient. I used to collect drugs at the facility for free. It got a time we used to pay some little amount before we were served, but recently there is no BP medication at the facility. If you are admitted into the facility and you are asked to buy any medication for treatment and you are unable to secure the medication, you are left to your own fate.
“So, for now we have resorted to going to some pharmacy services instead of wasting our time at facility which would offer us nothing. And if you are joking with this facility with your child condition you will bury your child. I lost my brother as a result when I went to buy medication just recently and this is happening on a daily basis,” she lamented.
She, however, appealed to the Bishop for the Navrongo Bolgatanga Dioceses, Bishop Alfred Agyenta, to come to the rescue of the community members from their current predicament by putting some measures in place at the facility.
“I took my child to the facility recently and was asked to go and buy malaria test kit for them to carry out malaria test on my child and the test revealed the child had malaria. The child was admitted and they asked me to buy a drip. I was just running up and down the whole day buying medication. And there are instances where we do not get the needed prescriptions in Sirigu. So now anytime our fall sick we usually rush to Bolgatanga to avoid what people are going through in Sirigu,” another resident, Issah Salima, told Word News.
Akobuligo-Zotipeliba Ayeoh-duko, a former Assembly Member in the area, indicated that he and his household for the past two years decided not to visit the facility. He said his family had resorted to patronizing a pharmacy or consulting nurses for advice “because the facility is virtually dead.”
“The stress to you go through to access the non-existent health service is so disheartening. And why should a facility, which does not have consumables, wards facility and other basic amenities to serve its clients engage the service of a doctor on locum to the tune of Gh¢7,434.20 monthly to the detriment of its clients who are no longer their concern which is the main aim or goal of the Ghana Health Service?” he said.
While disclosing that the presence of the Martyrs of Uganda Health Centre in the community had made authorities not to upgrade the nearby Busongo Clinic, Ayeoh-duko the Navrongo Bolgatanga Dioceses Health Directorate through Bishop Alfred Agyenta to address the challenges affecting health delivery in the area.
Efforts to speak to the head of the Catholic Relief Service, Dr Joseph Yinbila, were unsuccessful.
He cancelled an interview appointment he scheduled for June 14, 2023, because Word News was one hour late. He rescheduled the meeting for the following day but cancelled it for no reason.
When called a week later, he said he had some visitors and asked that the interview be done through an email address he gave. Word News did as he said but he has not provided any answers to date to the questions mailed to him on June 22, 2023.
By Gaspard Ayuureneeya