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Get off Mukono hospital affairs, municipality told
Elevated. Mukono General Hospital. Government has directed Mukono municipal authorities to leave the management of the hospital to the district. PHOTO BY JESSICA SABANO
What you need to know:
- Elevation of Mukono Health Centre IV to a hospital has since brought the number of hospitals in Mukono District to two. Another is St Francis Naggalama in Nakifuma County.
- When Buikwe District was carved out of Mukono District in 2000, the latter remained without a general hospital after Kawolo Hospital was taken by Buikwe District.
Government has directed Mukono municipal authorities fighting over the management of the general hospital to back off.
Dr Diana Atwine, the Ministry of Health permanent secretary, in a recent interview told Daily Monitor that the newly elevated hospital is supposed to be supervised by the district not the municipality as a section of local leaders claim.
The management of the hospital has been under contention between municipal and district authorities since July last year when government elevated the facility to a general hospital.
Last month, Mukono municipal councillors passed a resolution placing the hospital management under the municipality since it is located in the town. They also erected a signpost at the hospital indicating so.
“The hospital should be managed by the district because that is what we have in our structure. I really don’t know why municipal leaders have continued to pull ropes, their resistance will not help them at all,” Dr Atwine said.
She said the financial assistance from government to benefit the hospital has been channeled through the district.
“ Why have they [municipal council leaders] failed to understand this. Even their sign post is not supposed to be there[at the hospital],” the permanent secretary said.
In a September 5, 2019 letter, Dr Atwine wrote to the district leaders saying they had received funds for staff recruitment and an additional Shs500m for health infrastructure development to improve health service delivery at the facility.
Mukono Municipality deputy mayor Jamada Kajjoba said government should rather elevate Kojja Health Centre IV for the district to manage and leave Mukono Hospital for the municipality.
“If lobbying for a hospital is making us not manage it then let it remain a health centre IV, we even regret why we pushed for its elevation,” he said in a telephone interview on Saturday.
Mr Kajjoba said if government insists that the hospital management be supervised by the district, they are going to seek legal redress.
Background
The demand. The demand to have Mukono Health Centre IV elevated to a general hospital started in 2013 when municipal leaders applied to the Health ministry to have the unit upgraded. This was in response to the overwhelming number of patients seeking services at the health facility, which is in Mukono Town. In 2015, President Museveni officiated at the ground-breaking ceremony for the construction of the hospital, but it did not take off.
Number of patients. The health facility attends to at least 200 outpatients every day and between 7,500 and 8,000 deliveries a year from the districts of Mukono, Buvuma, Buikwe, Kayunga and parts of Wakiso.
In 2016 alone, it handled 6,322 deliveries and 1,500 caesarean sections.
