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last year, but Zimbabwe’s public hospitals are still understaffed.
The Finance Ministry has unfrozen 205 posts for registered general nurses, 115 State certified nurses, 17 Primary Care Nurses and 42 doctors.
While records indicate that Parirenyatwa Hospital has more senior medical resident officers (12 extra posts) and junior resident medical officers (seven extra) than it requi-res, Zimbabwe still has 48 percent less doctors than should be stationed at State facilities.
Mpilo Hospital also has more junior resident medical officers than the approved staff establishment.
The current doctors’ establishment for all disciplines in Government structures is 1 767, but only 916 posts are filled.
Similarly, 8 056 nurses are in posts throughout Zimbabwe against an establishment of 7 688.
According to the Health and Child Welfare Ministry’s projections, Zimbabwe will have a surplus of 60 RGNs by year-end. However, Acting Secretary for Health, Mr Christopher Tapfumanei said they were working with approved staff establishment figures from the 1960s.
This means the situation could be worse than presented as Zimbabwe’s population has increased significantly in the last 50 years.
“We have submitted a bid to the Health Services Board seeking an upward review of establishments because the current statistics in use were developed back in the 1960s, 1970s.
“The board is currently in the process of reviewing the establishments. Owing to emerging epidemics such as HIV and Aids, tuberculosis and sometimes cholera outbreaks, the workload has increased for our staff making it necessary for our establishment to be doubled since the current staff cannot sustain the workload.”
Mr Tapfumanei said long queues sometimes experienced at public health institutions and the “snail’s speed” by health personnel was attributable to a huge workload.
“Obviously, if they are overworked, they lose morale and as human beings sometimes their tempers are stretched resulting in poor service delivery at public health institutions. If we have enough staff in our institutions, service provision will definitely improve,” said Mr Tapfumanei.
He urged the Finance Ministry to put in place mechanisms that make deployment and recruitment of medical personnel easy.
At present, if an employee dies or leaves an institution, his or her post is automatically frozen.
The institutions then have to apply first to fill that post, a process that can take up to four months.
Furthermore, recent graduates cannot be deployed without approval from the Finance Ministry even if there is dire need for a post to be filled.
“We have vacant posts and people who are qualified to take up those posts, but they have to be approved first before we employ them,” said Mr Tapfumanei.
Finance Minister Tendai Biti froze recruitment of all civil servants in June last year, but gave leeway for institutions to apply for exemptions in exceptional circumstances.