Jomvu MP Badi Twalib has rejected a bid by the Mombasa county government to close down two health centres in his constituency.
According to the county health department, Miritini MCM and Jomvu Kuu health centres are among five health facilities in the county that are to be closed until further notice.
This is ostensibly to improve workforce distribution to support Covid-19 containment.
In a letter dated April 20, Public Health chief officer Aisha Ali Abubakar said Shimo Anex in Kisauni, Shimo Borstal in Kisauni and Mbuta CDF in Likoni are also supposed to be closed down.
“Following the magnitude of the workload in containment of the Covid-19 pandemic, it was decided that the facilities be and are hereby authorised to be closed until further notice,” the letter reads.
The closure is meant to free medics so they can help in the fight against Covid-19.
According to Abubakar, Shimo Borstal is supposed to retain only one nurse to serve the inmates while the maternity wing in the Mbuta CDF health centre in Likoni will remain serving the community.
However, Twalib said the fight against the coronavirus has to be taken to the grassroots arguing there is community transmission now after the virus started from cities in the developed countries.
“If you close these facilities, people at the grassroots will suffer more than they are now because of the coronavirus pandemic,” the MP said.
“These health centres must remain open. They will not be closed.”
He said there is a need for more health centres, especially at the grassroots, as opposed to what the county wants.
The support needed by the county in the fight against the coronavirus should be augmented by hiring more health workers for which the national government has released billions of shillings, Twalib said.
“Today, when one wants their child to be given polio vaccine, does it mean they will have to travel to the Coast General Hospital which is kilometres away?” he asked.
He said centralisation of healthcare is against President Uhuru’s Big Four agenda.
“Taking a patient suspected to be having Covid-19 from the grassroots in Jomvu all the way to Coast General Hospital is exposing many more people to the risk of infection.”
He will fight tooth and nail to ensure these two facilities are not closed down, he said.
“I will not allow any experiment to be done on my Jomvu people to see whether they will die or not without healthcare.”
He said there were other diseases before Covid-19.
“There is measles, polio and other diseases that are equally or even more dangerous than Covid-19. Why do you want to fight Covid-19 only to let our children be killed by other disease like pneumonia and malaria?” he asked.
He said preventive measures are more important than curative measures. “Furthermore, closing these facilities will render initiatives by organisations like World Vision which train community health workers almost useless.”
Kenya Medical Practitioners and Dentists Union secretary general Chibanzi Mwachonda on Saturday said the move will hurt the people at the grassroots.
“What will happen to the patients who depend on those facilities for their health? These other diseases are ongoing. It is not that they have paused because of corona,” the doctor said.
Mwachonda said there are pregnant women who have been going for ante-natal clinics, others have diabetic hypertension.
The KMPDU secretary general said as much as the union supports the establishment of more bed space for Covid-19, there is also a need for personnel.
“Personnel should be hired too. They need to plan for staff. Too much attention has shifted to Covid-19 forgetting other diseases,” Mwachonda said.
Edited by R.Wamochie