The Uganda Medical Association (UMA) has revealed that medical workers at the forefront of treating COVID-19 patients haven’t received heir allowances since August 2020.
The revelation was made by Dr. Richard Idro, the President of Uganda Medical Association while addressing journalists in Kampala on rights of health workers.
The Association called on the Ministry of Health to clear the outstanding risk allowances to medics on the forefront of treating patients infected by the coronavirus.
According to the Association, by 8th December, 2020, 1,560 health workers had been infected by COVID-19 and the majority of whom got the disease while on duty. 14 medics have so far succumbed to the deadly disease.
“… health workers specifically recruited to work in the COVID-19 wards haven’t received their salaries for the past two months. Their risk allowances haven’t been paid for much longer, yet with the increasing numbers of infections, the few health workers are already stretched and there is urgent need for more health workers,” Idro.
Ministry of Finance in its COVID-19 Interventions Report 2019/20 released in October 2020 had indicated that Ministry of Health had recruited 250 staff including epidemiologists, doctors, anesthetists, nurses, laboratory technologists, psychiatric clinical officers, ambulance assistants, drivers, emergency care assistance among others were recruited on contract for 6 months and deployed to the COVID-19 treatment centers and to support districts and Points of Entry in surveillance.
In the report, Government had claimed that allowances of over Shs10billion were paid to various health workers in response to the pandemic, a development the Association now disputes.
Idro also revealed that health workers who died from COVID-19 haven’t been compensated and other than the basic treatment they received when they were ill, there has been no further support for those who suffered severe disability or support for the families left behind. We are extremely disappointed that Government hasn’t listened to these concerns
The Association also warned Ugandans from travelling to villages for the festive season, saying the COVID-19 infections are increasing at the rate the health sector can’t cope up with, adding that the trend is only a tip of the iceberg, arguing that about 150,000 Ugandans are having only symptoms and only those with symptoms are able to access treatment centers.
The Medical body also raised concerns about the crowds during the ongoing political campaign and other public gatherings may now be a major contributor for the rapidly rising number of infections and unless the public starts to heed to the SOPs, we will soon start losing large numbers of people.
Idro said that the health facilities across the country are already stretched characterized by low availability of oxygen, ICUs are filled to capacity, and if the infections continue to rise, many people are bound to lose their lives.
“The Christmas season is coming and those living in towns and planning to travel to the villages to stay especially with their elderly parents to cancel this plan, otherwise, you risk transporting infection to your elderly parents, infect them and you may end up killing them,” said Idro.
In the COVID-19 Intervention report, Ministry of Finance revealed that the Ministry of Health signed Contracts worth Shs3.9bn in May 2020 with various service providers to procure PPES for medics.
However, there were loopholes in the contracts with the Budget Monitoring Unit at Ministry of Finance revealing that N2M Company Ltd delivered 3,200 surgical masks, each packet containing 50 masks was sold at Shs247,343 translating to Shs4,946 per mask. This was noted to be expensive. Review of the contract document indicated that there were no witnesses to contract signing.
The Association also lashed out at Government for imposing Shs100,000 Stamp Duty tax on medics, a decision they say put doctors among the highly taxed professionals in Uganda.
Now, the doctors have to pay Pay As You Earn, traders licenses for those manning clinics, doctors also pay Shs100,000 for registration and annual licence fee between Shs100,000-Shs350,000 depending on specialization. There is membership to the Association, as well as more membership fee to specialist association. There is annual subscription fee
Results of COVID-19 tests done on 13 December 2020 confirmed 234 new cases, bringing Uganda’s cumulative confirmed cases to 27,766.
Uganda also registered 3 COVID-19 deaths pushing the total COVID-19 deaths to 224.
Credit: businessfocus.co.ug
