The future of Bokamoso is in limbo

| Friday September 10, 2010 00:00

In fact, so gloomy is the picture that the hospital may even close, going the way of Hyundai, Volvo and many other projects of strategic national importance that went to the wall for lack of support.  Within a short space of time, Bokamoso has established itself as a centre of excellence, ahead of even our country’s envisaged Health Hub.  Hence it beats common sense that the government should still be referring people to famous Jo’burg when Gaborone has a world-class facility manned by world-class specialists and other personnel.  In fact, in certain respects, Bokamoso is in a class of its own because some of its equipment cannot be found anywhere else on the African continent.  But all this investment hangs in limbo because of the colonial holdover that South  African facilities are superior and more worthy of the millions of pula that the Government of Botswana pays them per year.  It is an expensive holdover; one that translates into a mammoth P250-million deficit at Bokamoso, thanks to the government’s reluctance to use its specialised services.  We are told that in the seven months that the hospital has been in operation, the government has referred no more than 30 patients to the hospital.  And even then, these were mainly for diagnostics because the computerised tomography scanner (CT scan) at Princess Marian Hospital (PMH) broke down.

Surely someone must explain the obstacles encountered in referring patients to a well-equipped local hospital and the contrasting alacrity with which patients are jettisoned across the border!  Or are we wrong to expect this? 

Surely someone must have cogent reasons why the hierarchical upheavals and logistics of referring patients to a foreign country should proceed more smoothly than taking them to a facility next door!  Or are we being overly optimistic even to think of it?  Let us take the scene at Princess Marina’s Accident and Emergency department where patients in a critical condition spend hours waiting to be seen, some grotesque figures on the floor because the bays are full and wheelchairs do not exist.  This scene gets worse during weekends and holidays, much worse at month-end weekends, giving PMH the appearance of a field hospital in a war zone simply because Botswana’s only referral hospital is overburdened and overrun.  Against this scene, a multiple-bed emergency unit lies idle at Bokamoso, while accident victims in Mmopane (where Bokamoso is located) are carted away over 15 kilometres in ill-equipped ambulances - if they are lucky - to PMH.  Once there, it may be months before they are jettisoned to South Africa for diagnostics.  But in inviting the President of Namibia to officially open Bokamoso, President Khama was advertising the hospital as a facility capable of use to the wider SADC region.  The government would do well to take the lead in this regard because, as they say in the wide world, charity begins at home! 

                                                        Today’s thought

                                 “An investment in knowledge always pays the best interest.”

- Benjamin Franklin  (American Statesman, Scientist, Philosopher, Printer, Writer and Inventor. 1706-1790)