Sygeplejersker på Pumwani Maternity Hospital i Eastleigh i hovedstaden Nairobi i Kenya har afsløret forfærdelige forhold på fødeafdelingen. Både nyfødte, deres mødre og personalet er i fare, hedder det.
A go-slow by nurses at Pumwani Maternity Hospital in Nairobi’s Eastleigh area has exposed serious challenges at Kenya’s largest maternity hospital, with officials calling for urgent intervention to improve services.
– Working conditions at the hospital remain deplorable, Festus Ngare, secretary-general of the Kenya Local Government Workers’ Union, which represents the nurses, told IRIN.
– Although we have reached agreement with the hospital’s management on some of the issues and others are still pending, the working environment at the hospital is a major concern for all.
The 180 nurses at the hospital staged the go-slow on 16 March to protest at being overworked and the withholding of their uniform and other allowances by the hospital’s management.
According to Pumwani’s chief executive officer, Fridah Govedi, the hospital delivers an average of 80-100 babies daily, 20 of them by Caesarian sections.
Ideally, she said, there should be one nurse for four patients but in Pumwani one nurse can serve up to 20 patients.
