Member of Parliament for Nabdam in the Upper East region, Mr Mark Kurt Nawaane, has attributed the shortage of essential equipment in hospitals to the misallocation of resources by the government within the healthcare sector.
He argues that the substantial amount of money allocated to the health sector should ideally result in well-equipped hospitals capable of handling major health issues.
“If you look at the amount of money that comes into the health sector in a year, we should be doing better than this, and I blame everybody, including the politicians, including the technocrats who are supposed to advise the politicians and probably the whole country, because we start certain things and we do not ask questions; we are just happy we started them,” he said while speaking on JoyNews’ AM Show on February 1.
Mr. Mark Kurt Nawaane responded to the “Sick Hospitals” documentary by JoyNews, pointing out the lack of basic equipment, including a defibrillator, at the Effia Nkwanta Hospital.
He attributed ongoing issues in the health sector to a lack of transparency and accountability in the utilization of funds allocated to the sector.
Additionally, Deputy Ranking Member of the Health Committee in Parliament, Kwabena Mintah Akandoh, criticized the government’s Agenda 111 hospital initiative, stating that despite the $200 million spent, no new hospital beds have been added to existing hospitals.
He argued that the funds could have been more effectively utilized to improve existing hospitals.
“Since we started, we spent almost $200 million on Agenda 111, and we have not added a single bed in terms of the number of beds in the country. We have not been able to do that, so we ask ourselves, what are our aims?
“What do we want to solve? And you realize that, as a nation, honestly speaking, we are not putting our priorities right. We are simply getting everything wrong, and we are applauding when we should be condemning. This is what is happening in the country in the health sector,” he stated.