By Okong’o Oduya
County government of Busia has stepped in to avert a looming strike threat for nurses and doctors at Busia county and referral hospital staged to start next week .
The expected strike which is as a result of the county government to fulfill an agreement arrived at last year over promotions would see crucial health services paralyzed at the hospital.
According to patients we spoke to nurses and doctors are on go slow as they prepare for major strike next week as from Tuesday to boycott their duties. They claim nurses convened for a meeting yesterday and decided that they will low down their tools as from next week, to force the county government to promote most of them as per their agreement early this year. They noted that some nurses have already warned them early to find other alternatives since they won’t be working as from next week.They believe that this strike will affect them badly.
“We are worried; we don’t know where we will go or what we will do if nurses and doctors go on strike as they are planning. Today we saw them meeting outside there and I believe they were planning how to start their strike early next week. In fact some of them have already warned us over the same,” Ruth Lemunya a patient said.
County’s deputy Governor, Kizito Wangalwa who paid a visit at the hospital,said patients urged the government to intervene and address issues raised by nurses to avert the strike. They blamed the management of the hospital adding that they are doing little to address issues affecting the staff members.
“Nurses and doctors are doing what they can in delivering their services; the problem is with the administration. They don’t provide favorable environment for doctors to work . It is high time they start to look into their grievances to avoid frequent strikes .” he added.
Responding to their queries deputy governor Mr. Wangalwa said as a county government they don’t see the reason as to why nurses should go on strike. According to him the county government is in the process of implementing what they agreed with the nurses. He says more than 200 doctors and nurses have been promoted by the county government as they agreed early this year.
“The issue of promotion is something we have been working on and we are still working on it. As we are speaking I have a list of more than 200 doctors and nurses who have been promoted and I don’t see why it has to create chaos in the hospital”, said wangalwa.
He further said if there will be other demands that is being raised by the doctors they will address them amicably without having strike.
He also noted that as a county government they faced lots of challenges in health sector but with time they are sorting out the problems . There were no enough drugs in public hospitals across the county, but we now have enough drugs in hospitals and others in our stores adding that there is no need for patients to go buy drugs in chemists. He warned anybody who directs patients to buy drugs from outside saying that will not be tolerated.
Health workers strikes have been common in most counties where doctors and nurses have complained of delayed salaries and poor working conditions.
