KMPDU raises queries following death of 2-year-old boy who had fork jembe lodged in skull

The Kenya Medical Practitioners, Pharmacists and Dentists Union (KMPDU) has raised queries and concerns on the public healthcare system after a two-year-old boy who had a fork jembe lodged in his skull died at the Kenyatta National Hospital (KNH) on Tuesday.

KMPDU, in a statement issued on Saturday by Secretary General Dr. Davji Atellah, said the boy’s death is yet another of many similar avoidable incidences that should serve to remind Kenyans that “none of us is safe until the public healthcare system guarantees the highest attainable standards of emergency care to the humblest among us.”

Dr. Atellah cited the December 7, 2020 death of Dr. Stephen Mogusu, who passed on after contracting COVID-19 from the ward he was working at, as another that could also have been prevented but that occurred due to weaknesses in the healthcare system.

The union boss also raised concern about the status of the Thika Level 5 Hospital, where the boy was taken before being referred to KNH, questioning why it was unable to treat him yet - in book - should have had the capacity to do so.

“While the facts surrounding the death of this innocent young boy remain scanty and far between, there seems to be a pattern. He got injured at their home in Kiambu County: was taken to a small village dispensary where the right call was made to refer him to Thika Level 5 Hospital. KMPDU has indeed taken time to audit the Service Competency Profile prescribed by the Government of Kenya and has concluded that for Thika Level 5 Hospital to be considered a Level 5 Hospital, it needs to have at least a Neurosurgeon, an Anaesthesiologist consultant, among other Consultants and Intensive Care Unit (ICU) capabilities,” stated Dr. Atellah.

“The question Kenyans ought to be asking is why Thika Level 5 Hospital under the management of the Kiambu County Government and the leadership of Kimani Wamatangi could not attend to this boy at the time he was presented at the hospital. Does Thika Level 5 Hospital meet the standards of a Level 5 Hospital as the name suggests or is it another of the Hospitals that dot the face of the Republic which are branded with big names on billboards by Governors to serve Public Relations purposes, but lack the basic competence to render the services commensurate to the status they so profess? Why has the Kiambu County Government remained mute over this incident, yet it has the primary duty to deliver health services to the people of Kiambu?”

Dr. Atellah termed health service delivery as an expensive public utility that should be under the State, funded by Kenyans’ collective taxes.

He urged the government to invest in a skilled healthcare workforce in an effort to attain the highest standards of health services in the country.

“Commercializing the delivery of Health-care Services deepens inequality and alienates the very poor who need the services the most and cannot afford to pay for it on commercial terms,” opined Dr. Atellah.

“For Universal Health Care to be realized, the consumers of Health Services must NOT be made to pay for services at the point of use. It is this realization that has distinguished the true UHC model as implemented by the United Kingdom's Government under the National Health Services Trust from the commercial model which is insurance driven as implemented in other parts of the World.”

He further added: “Healthcare is expensive and inaccessible to a majority of Kenyans. Consequently, the State has no choice except to ringfence special taxes for the sole purpose of delivering Health services as a service of public good.”