Health Minister lies to World Health Assembly in Geneva

By Tererai Karimakwenda
May 18, 2007

The government controlled Herald newspaper reports that the Minister of Health and Child Welfare Dr David Parirenyatwa, has urged the World Health Assembly meeting in Geneva, Switzerland to call for the unconditional lifting of targeted sanctions imposed on Zimbabwe by the European Union and the United States. Referring to them as “illegal sanctions” the minister said they were “severely compromising the country’s health delivery system and affecting the poor people of Zimbabwe.

The truth is the sanctions are targeted at Robert Mugabe and his closest allies, banning them from travelling and freezing their assets in member countries. The minister used the usual government spin that pretends there is much more to the restrictions, saying that it was a fallacy that the sanctions were targeted at individuals. But he did not explain which specific restrictions were allegedly impacting on our health delivery system.

In his address to the assembly on Thursday, Parirenyatwa said: "Some powerful countries have imposed economic and other forms of sanctions on our country. The knock-on effects these measures are having on the health of the people of Zimbabwe cannot be over emphasised. As a result of this, the quality of our health services provision has been compromised.”

Health experts and officials in Zimbabwe have blamed a serious shortage of foreign currency for the lack of resources and medicines that has plagued health services for years, created by gross mismanagement of the economy. The majority of qualified staff have also left for greener pastures, citing extremely poor salaries well below the poverty datum line and bad working conditions.

While Parirenyatwa was busy in denial in Geneva, a senior medical practitioner told Newsreel on Thursday that a ‘tremendous’ number of patients have died of preventable conditions, because of the state of the country’s health delivery service. Dr Henry Madzorera said the system was now on its knees and the situation was set to worsen as medical operations at central and district hospitals have been suspended and emergencies were not being dealt with. Many wards have also been closed because of the unavailability of nurses.

Doctors at all major government hospitals are back on strike demanding a salary review hardly two months after their last increment. A sharp rise in the cost of living has almost doubled prices since then.