Government admits low pay threatening health services

The government of Kenya admitted on Thursday that the country’s hospitals were facing a serious shortage of medical staff as doctors and nurses left the country in search of better jobs abroad, according to news reports. “It is true that doctors are leaving the country for greener pastures abroad. This is because of the low salaries they are earning in Kenya”, the ‘East African Standard’ quoted the Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Health, Julius Meme, as saying.

Meme said Kenyan doctors in public service earned a maximum of Ksh 31,880 (US $414) per month, while their South African counterparts were paid the equivalent of Ksh 200,000 (US $2,600). Kenyan doctors have demanded a 300 percent pay rise, to rise the salary of the lowest paid to Ksh 61,000 (US $792). However, the ‘East African Standard’ quoted Minister of Medical Services Maalim Muhammad as saying that the government could not afford the increase demanded.

The Kenya Medical Association (KMA) on Tuesday warned that emigration of medical professionals was threatening the very existence of the country’s health services. The KMA said that low pay was forcing about 20 doctors to leave Kenya each month to take up better jobs in other countries, and that Kenya currently had only 600 doctors and 70 dentists in the public sector, to treat over 28 million people. This ‘brain drain’ had contributed to a general deterioration in medical services, and health facilities were increasingly available only to the wealthy, it added.

Meme said the government planned to continue to provide health services across Kenya by redistributing the country’s remaining doctors. “We have to take deliberate steps which will see us make do with the few remaining doctors,” he said.

Opposition Democratic Party MP and shadow minister for education, Matu Wamae, called on the government to establish a task force to tackle the crisis in the health sector. “As it is now, we are the laughing stock to countries who receive our professionals,” he said.