Hospital in crisis

By HELEN TARAWA
HEALTH services at a provincial hospital are grinding to a halt as nurses, doctors and health extension officers start leaving because of the lack of funds and medicine.
There is only a skeleton staff operating in sections of the Popondetta Hospital in Northern, including the outpatient wards and the maternity wing where long queues are seen every day.
Northern health authority acting chief executive Copland Ihove said he was not aware of the situation and could not comment on it.
Health Secretary Pascoe Kase said he was also not aware of the situation in Popondetta but would get his officials to investigate.
Senior surgeon Dr Opum Petrus who had served there for more than six years said he was leaving to take up a position in Daru.
According to information from Popondetta, there had been no clear direction during the transition of the management of the hospital to the provincial health authority. The Popondetta Hospital and the rural health services were recently merged to facilitate the establishment of the provincial health authority last December. It became the 12th province to have its health authority established.
Health and HIV/AIDs Minister Sir Puka Temu said then the health functional grants would go directly to the authority board. But authority chairman Eric Mesak said yesterday that clear directives had been given.
“The board directive was made clear to the management team in a meeting four weeks ago,” he said.
He blamed the current situation on the chief executive officer Dr Touai Giara, the former acting hospital chief executive officer, and his team. “There are no funds because they were misused and abused,” Mesak said.
Giara could not be reached for a comment yesterday. Sources said the lack of medicine and supplies is affecting the delivery of health services. There is also no money to pay for the transport of workers on shift duties. It is understood that the transition process was also affecting the disbursement of funds as changes had not been made to the signatories of the bank accounts. Meanwhile, Kase said a four-month stock of medicine for malaria was sent last week.
“I’m trying to find out if there were any shortages when the team arrived last week and will send more drugs if usage has increased in the last month.”