A few years back my niece died in her sleep. She was a doctor. She had been to Cuba to study medicine for 8 years and then came to Kenya and did some exams and did internship and she was posted to a certain level 5 hospital. This is where she practiced for a few years before her demise. Her funeral was full of crying doctors some Cuban. It’s a shocking sight to see a group of doctors crying because we are so used to doctors being stoic.
She worked in the pediatric ward with other young ladies who were her age mates. I learnt of the enormous personal sacrifices doctors in public hospitals. They would changa money for their patients who needed more advanced care when the ailing kid came from a destitute family.
A picture has been painted in this country of doctors as Predators which is also true. I guess when you as a doctor realise how little you can do, you realise that if you can’t beat them, join them. I mean as a new doctor you can change for a patient but after 5 months of not getting a salary yourself you realize that your doctor Ness means nothing if you have nothing monetary to show for it, your good heart isn’t currency so you turn into a money hungry mongrel. You know what they say about pessimists being disillusioned optimists. The road to hell is truly paved with good intentions.
Kenya is a failed state and for many of us, we are somehow sheltered from that fact but you see glimpses of it and you just get so used to it that it’s normalised. I mean I am irritated on a daily basis as to how a boda boda rider can confidently at high speed be on the wrong side of the road and there are cops who do nothing. The cop isn’t there to stop rogue bikers from the being on the wrong side of the road. They’re there to get their finje to give their superiors.
Now, the failedness of the state is manifesting in medical field. Being a doctor in Kenya is a big deal. We have a few doctors in the family. They hook us up with the best specialists, get us beds in hospitals right quick, for you to lose a doctor in a family it is a huge blow.
Now the ratio of doctor to patients is very low in Kenya. It gets worse for specialists. My cousin is a specialist and the only one I believe in the country in her area, she’s usually overwhelmed and she is in a private hospital and doesn’t have a private practice yet, the other day, a kidney specialist died in Kenyatta who was the only specialist in the country of his area of specialization. I know one specialist I think he was a neurosurgeon, who would see patients upto 10pm in his private practice, he’d be nodding off bcz he’s old, he’s a professor so he teaches at Chiromo, then he does surgeries and hospital rounds.
We are not exactly drowning in doctors in Kenya and it gets worse if you are poor and can’t afford to go to a private hospital like Nairobi Hospital and Aga Khan. If you don’t know someone you will be waiting for 24 hrs like Prof Walibora until you die. The irony is if you are in an ACCIDENT or you are a victim of a carjacking and you are shot, you may have all the money and medical cover but end up at a level 5 hospital or the nearest public hospital . Where it’s just chaotic. Gakuru the late governor of Nyeri landed in a level 5 hospital. MHSRIP.
If PPEs can save our doctors lives then government needs to prioritize that because we will have a crisis if doctors keep dying at the rate they are dying and majority of these doctors are young doctors. By the way so many Kenyan doctors have opted for greener pastures in the west especially the ones who have specialized in areas that have shortages the world over.
You realise how far we as a nation have fallen when a doctor is asking you for fare. Kenyans are known for their amnesia because we have too many problems that if we don’t accept and move on the madness in this country is debilitating.
We are a failed state, the realization comes slowly, you sell your grade cow and land to send your child to Garrisa university, where your child is massacred by 3 boys for several hours until the boy terrorists run out of ammunition and kill themselves. You become a doctor after the hell of going through med school you believe that you have arrived. You find yourself living at the brink of poverty and working like a dog and then begging for donations to be admitted to the hospital you slave at even after 5 months with out pay, with no gloves, no masks, nothing. You do CS delivery without gloves in a country with a government.
Frankly, I don’t know where we are headed as a people and as a nation, those of you with children, at the rate we are going because we are actually getting worse by the hour, what future do you see for your posterity. Let’s be very honest with ourselves Kenyans unless things change, THERE IS NO FUTURE . If we are at 10 trillion debt in 10 years. By 2030,we could easily be even at 20 trillion or more of debt bcz most of the debt we acquire or our leaders acquire is bad debt.
Those of us who were there in Moi era, we know what 24 years of bad governance did to our country, everyone including the rich and mighty felt what it was like to live in a failed state, dilapidated roads, water and power rationing. It was crazy. The dark days are slowly but surely making a comeback. Kenyans we are in big trouble. Big, big trouble. Frankly now all we have left is God because we are totally on our own, if an esteemed person in any society like a doctor can not get a salary for 5 months yet Governors, MPs all get salary without delay, in a pandemic, donations to protect our greatest resource, our medics, in such a time are looted mercilessly, a doctor can not afford admission in a public hospital? I mean frankly we have hit rock bottom as a country. I don’t know what else I can say about this country anymore. We have hit rock bottom. Kabisa. It’s exasperating being a Kenyan. If a doctors life has no value in the middle of a global pandemic, what hope is there for the other majority poor Kenyans? Almost 50 million Kenyans are at the mercy of 2 or 3 people sort of how the entire country was at the mercy of Moi at one time. I don’t know but aii it’s very grim. Very.