It is an unarguable fact that Liberia’s healthcare system has suffered critical challenges since the end of the civil war that destroyed the country’s infrastructures and claimed the lives of scores of citizens.
It is even more unimaginable that in this 21st Century, an independent nation as old as 177 years, is still struggling to establish even a mini-vibrant health system at a time when the world is moving at a fast pace; most serious nations have long executed the bread and butter systemic issues, and are now striving to ensure the use of modern scientific and technological services to achieve optimal healthcare systems that deliver effective services to their citizens.
Appallingly, Liberia, unlike other nations, is yet confronted with the most unthinkable challenges in its healthcare delivery system ranging from lack of modern diagnostic equipment at health facilities, limited access to quality life-saving medications, poor and delayed treatment of sick patients that leads to increased death of citizens from curable diseases, compounded by the lack trained internal medical and specialized doctors at health facilities to timely handle critical health emergencies.
For instance, authorities at the Marshall Medical Center in Margibi County recently disclosed that the hospital lacks access to electricity, leaving nurses to work under unfavorable conditions at night.
The Administrator of the hospital James Peters told President Joseph Nyuma Boakai during a visit at the facility that due to the lack of electricity, nurses are left with no options but to deliver pregnant women through the use of phone lights- a highly risky venture.
Peters said the only ambulance at the hospital has broken down, causing major setbacks for patients during emergency health services, and it is fair enough to say that the issues at the Marshall Medical Center are just a few of the challenges confronting the healthcare system in general.
For his part, President Boakai applauded the nurses and administrators at the hospital for their sacrificial work towards the people of Marshall City and assured them of his government’s commitment towards improving the infrastructure of the hospital.
In view of these ongoing challenges within our healthcare system, we agree with the Liberia leader that “There is no hospital that can work without electricity” and it’s hard to even believe that this is happening in this 21st Century. However, electricity is just one aspect of the whole systemic crisis. There are other more pressing issues of lack of doctors and nurses, lack of medical equipment, lack of essential medications, slow health response due to unnecessary bureaucracies, amongst others.
In all these, we think that the ordinary citizens are at the full negative end of these healthcare woes and it is only prudent that the government stops the “talk-talk” and begin to take direct holistic actions to improve healthcare delivery in Liberia.
We call on the Government of Liberia to invest in a healthcare system that is safe, timely, effective, efficient, equitable and patient-centered, universally known as the “STEEEP” System.
This will ensure training of more specialized physicians and general internal medicine specialists at health facilities, timely and effective distribution of essential medicines across the healthcare system, effective ambulance services as well as providing specialized medical equipment and laboratory advancement for the diagnosis of different diseases.
Until this is achieved, we believe that the country’s health will continue to waddle in platitudes of disaster and further lead to an unhealthy population that will in turn produce negative results across all sectors.
Therefore, let the Government of Liberia fix the health system of the country. Health is wealth and no unhealthy nation can experience development.
