Author: Healthtimes

‘Results Based Financing Not A Magic Bullet For Zim Health’

Healthtimes

ZIMBABWE should not rely on Results Based Financing (RBF) only but explore other options for financing the healthcare delivery system, a member of the Zimbabwe College of Public Health Physicians said. By Kudakwashe Pembere Dr Ngonidzashe Masuka told HealthTimes that lessons learnt in Zimbabwe on RBF show that the country has got the capacity landscape for health financing, strategic purchasing in health, how to prioritise benefit packages and how to pay for them. Zimbabwe has got a lot of lessons that have been learnt from implementing results based financing program…

Read More

Operation Shoot To Kill Stray Dogs Looms In Harare

Healthtimes

A Harare City official says killing stray dogs in the City is the best way to contain the growing burden of rabies. By Kudakwashe Pembere With 29 cases of dog bites in the third week of this year, Harare City head of epidemiology and disease control Dr Kudzai Masunda said Harare is now a rabies zone. Just as a highlight,  week 3 of 2020, Harare is not a Malaria Zone but we also do treat Malaria. Watery diarrhoea we had 282. So our average in most cases is about 230…

Read More

BREAKING: 22 Monitored In Zim For Novel CoronaVirus

Healthtimes

TWENTY-two persons coming from Wuhan, the hotspot of the novel CoronaVirus are being monitored by Zimbabwe’s Health Ministry for signs and symptoms of the rare respiratory tract infection, HealthTimes has learnt. By Kudakwashe Pembere In an interview on the sidelines of a combined interagency coordination committee on health and the national taskforce on epidemic prone diseases meeting on Friday Health Ministry director of epidemiology and disease control Dr Portia Manangazira said these people arrived at the Robert Mugabe International Airport yesterday. “We have begun the monitoring of these people. Our team…

Read More

Diagnostics Critical For Better Health Outcomes, Says Health Minister

Healthtimes

AT a time when the country’s public health system is shrouded in diagnostic equipment crisis, this gap should be bridged for Zimbabwe to have better health outcomes, Health Minister Dr Obadiah Moyo has said. By Kudakwashe Pembere Researches have been done on the challenges faced by the HIV community in accessing viral load test results. Viral load testing is done through diagnostic equipment from Samba Diagnostics, Abbott Diagnostics to mention but these few. Hospitals are said to have dumped obsolete and broken equipment due to ignorance. Dr Moyo noted diagnostics…

Read More

Harare Central Hospital To Pilot UAE, Estonia e-Health Project

Healthtimes

THE United Arab Emirates Government has brought in Estonian e-Health experts to Zimbabwe as part of its commitment to improve the country’s health delivery system. By Kudakwashe Pembere This is the third time the UAE visited has visited Zimbabwe on health related matters with this time, the nation expected to benefit from the strong expertise of Estonia on e-health issues. Health and Child Care Minister Dr Obadiah Moyo said the Estonian experts will compliment the projects done in Mashonaland East province which seek to digitalise health records in hospitals. He…

Read More

ZAN Spells Out Community Centered Vision For 2020

Healthtimes

THE country has made significant strides in its HIV/AIDS response with government working hand in glove with civil society organisations working within and with communities. The tagline for the 2020 HIV response worldwide is ‘Communities Make The Difference’ as nations aim to reach the 90-90-90 targets of having 90 percent tested, 90 percent of those tested getting on treatment and the 90 percent on treatment having a suppressed viral load. Derailing efforts made in reducing the HIV/AIDS burden in Zimbabwe are psychological issues such as stigma, denial and defaulting as…

Read More

Health Seeking Behavior Declines As Poverty Bites Zimbabweans

Healthtimes

HEALTH seeking behaviour in the country has been deteriorating between 2017 and 2019 owing to high poverty levels coupled with unavailability of some health services, a 2019 Mini Poverty, Income, Consumption and Expenditure Survey (PICES) report shows. By Kudakwashe Pembere Presenting the latest findings at the launch of the 2017 PICES and 2019 Mini PICES, World Bank Senior Economist Rob Swinkels said the survey was a follow upon the 2017 PICS. In 2017, the proportion of people who got sick in the past 30days for rural populace was 12percent increasing…

Read More

How Animal Medications Are Fueling Drug Resistance In Humans

Healthtimes

ITS 10:00 in the morning and a Harare man walks into one of the Agroshops licensed as Veterinary Medicine General Dealers in the central business district enquiring of a possible remedial solution for his dying chickens. By  Kudakwashe Pembere Panting heavily and with a sad look, he tells the cashier the symptoms. Even though the attendant advises that the man takes the dead chickens for a post mortem, he proceeds to dispense some Oxytetetracycline which he says could cure the birth flue and get rid of the bacterial infection. He…

Read More

Zim To Host 6th Africa SDG Conference

Healthtimes

ZIMBABWE will next month host the sixth session of the Africa Regional Forum on Sustainable Development. The country committed to make progress in 2015 towards achieving the sustainable development goals. By Kudakwashe Pembere The event will be running under the theme, “2020-2030, A Decade To A Transformed And Prosperous Africa Through The 2030 Agenda.” Addressing journalists, Public Service, Labour and Social Welfare Minister Dr Sekesai Nzenza said this forum is an inter-governmental and multisectoral platform convened annually by the economic commission for Africa in collaboration with the African union commission.…

Read More

NatPharm Rebranding On Cards

Healthtimes

GOVERNMENT is reconsidering renaming the National Pharmaceutical Company (NatPharm) to a yet to be discovered more extensive name, HealthTimes can reveal. By Kudakwashe Pembere Health and Child Care Minister Dr Obadiah Moyo told HealthTimes  that the ‘National Medical Pharmaceutical Warehouse’ procures more than just pharmaceutical drugs hence the need to revisit the nomenclature. In actual fact to say NatPharm that might be a misnomer and misleading. So we might have to relook into that name. “Rebranding could be very necessary. We would want to come up with a name that…

Read More