By Nasibo Kabale, NAIROBI Kenya
The ability of Kenya’s healthcare system to
handle the surge in coronavirus cases is much weaker than many believe.
The
Ministry of Health has already announced that the country is likely to have
10,000 coronavirus cases by the end of April.
As
confirmed cases continue to increase, there are 59 by Tuesday, one of the
biggest issues doctors could face is finding space to treat patients requiring
medical assistance.
Whether
Kenya has enough hospital beds to treat all those who could become infected is
questionable. Available data on hospital capacity suggests the country does
not.
Kenya also
has a shortage of inpatient beds with the national average for inpatient bed
density at 13.3 beds per 10,000 population. This is below the World Health
Organisation (WHO) target of 25 and the global average for lower middle-income
countries of 18.
Data by
the Kenya National Bureau of Statistics (KNBS) and the Kenya Institute for
Public Policy Research and Analysis (KIPPRA) show that although there has been
a remarkable expansion of healthcare infrastructure by counties, the number of
facilities and workforce remain inadequate to cater for demand by a steadily
rising population in need of such services.
Healthcare
infrastructure has seen expansion and improvement with an increase in the
number of facilities from 8,616 before devolution in 2013 to 11,324 in 2017.
This has increased the national average facility density from 19 to 24 per
100,000 people.
About 80
per cent of the facilities are at Level Two (dispensaries) and Three (health
centres), which focus on primary healthcare, while 20 per cent of the
facilities fall in Levels Four and Five.
These
comprise secondary health facilities and provide specialised services, while
Level Six facilities are highly-specialised referral hospitals and provide
healthcare, teaching, and training and research services. On average, in the
last four years, the density has been 22 health facilities per 100,000 people.
On the
other hand, Kenya Harmonized Health Facility Assessment 2018/19 indicates that
the mean availability of standard precaution for infection prevention items is
at 65 per cent.
Only 12
per cent of health facilities had all items for standard precaution for
infection prevention such as disposable syringes, disinfectant, safe final
disposal of sharps, safe disposal of infectious waste, alcohol based
sanitisers, appropriate storage of infectious waste.
The report
shows that on average, health facilities had 55 per cent of basic amenities
available with only six per cent of the facilities having all basic amenities.
Efficient
delivery of health services requires skilled personnel in adequate numbers.
These include doctors, clinical officers, nurses, pharmacists, laboratory
personnel, and specialists at different levels of care. In addition to
healthcare caregivers, other supportive staff cadres include the managerial
staff, records officers, and cleaners.
Understanding
their numbers are therefore critical in planning for resource allocation,
expansion of human resource capacity and identifying gaps. - Daily Nation
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