WINDHOEK – Oshakati State Hospital in Oshana Region is set to become a referral hospital, the Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Health and Social Services, Andrew Ndishishi, has revealed. The present hospital will be upgraded to the level of the Windhoek Central Hospital.
Currently Namibia has only one Class A hospital which is the Windhoek Central Hospital. It is a highly specialist hospital to which all hospitals in the country refer their patients. Ndishishi said it is being envisaged that by 2030 Namibia will have two more Class A hospitals, namely Oshakati hospital by 2023 and Rundu hospital by 2030.
“We are currently training health professionals to fill all the posts in different hospitals across the country,” said Ndishishi.
“I am very confident that this will happen because with all this human resources we are deploying our dream will be realised sooner than later,” he said, adding that it would be a “reality not just an idea”.
“What is holding us up now is the qualified health staff,” he said.
Ndishishi said plans are underway to build a Khomas regional hospital to ease pressure on the Windhoek Central Hospital.
Furthermore, the plan is also to upgrade the Onandjokwe, Otjiwarongo, Katima Mulilo and Keetmanshoop hospitals to the level of district (Class B) hospitals such as the Katutura hospital by the year 2018.
“People will no longer have to travel long distances but you as you plan you also need the people to do the work. Howoever, very soon the problem of doctors will be something of the past,” he told New Era.
Ndishishi said in order to increase access, equity and less referral to the classes A – B hospitals there was a need to build more hospitals at other levels. “Therefore the ministry targets to build five new hospitals – in Tsumkwe, Windhoek, Ondangwa and Rosh Pinah by the year 2023. Also on the cards it the construction of 60 new health centres and 350 clinics by the year 2030,” he said.
Ndishishi said he hates to see Namibians feeling hopeless and thinking that the government is doing nothing, not knowing that the government is hard at work.
“I don’t want our people to feel hopeless and to say that government is doing nothing no, no … things are happening, the public just don’t know,” he said.
“Right now I am coming out of a meeting with the delegation of First Moscow University in Russia – they are going to take 100 students to Moscow before August,” he said.
He added: “Although this is not going to be a walk in the park I am very confident that our dream will be realised.”
ktjitemisa@newera.com.na
By Kuzeeko Tjitemisa