In the corner of a store room, gathering dust… some parts still in packing cases. More, covered in plastic sheeting.
Medical equipment. Parked… because there are no professionals to operate any of it.
As ‘online khabar’ a news web-portal reports;
‘It has been two years since a five-bed intensive care unit with a ventilator was set up at Jaleshwor Hospital in Mahottari…
… due to a lack of skilled medical personnel, the hospital has not been able to operate its ICU and… sends… patients elsewhere.
To operate an ICU and the equipment… the hospital needs at least one internal medicine expert, one anaesthesiologist, four medical officers and 10 staff nurses.
… according to the hospital… it only has one permanent doctor, four staff nurses and six helpers.’
Where are we talking about? Mahottari? It’s in Nepal.
The provincial government set up the ICU, but they’ve not been able to fill the vacancies needed to run it.
Not far away, Myagdi’s, Beni Hospital is in a similar state. The hospital has five ICU beds two with ventilators for adults and four ICU beds with two ventilators for children.
The hospital’s medical superintendent, Dr Jitendra Kandel, says out of 65 positions in the hospital, only 13 have been filled so far.
The online report continues;
‘This is a story in most hospitals in the country… hospitals lack a proper system, do not have the infrastructure… most do not have the human resource to operate the available medical equipment to provide services to people.’
During Covid the Nepal government did all it could to improve hospital facilities across the country but like so many, global health systems, it does not have enough doctors and nurses.
Writing in the Himalayan Times, in praise of the Nepal health system, Simone Galimberti says;
‘Hospitals … are, in many ways, paragons of exemplary delivery of public service… [but] … things could work better… on many fronts; manpower… lacking or underpaid or unrecognised, and resources… scarce…’
Nepal has a health-worker population ratio of 0.67 doctors and nurses per 1,000.
The WHO recommends 2.3 per 1,000. That is why Nepal is on their recruitment ‘red list’… making it clear that no active recruitment may take place unless…
… unless, there is government to government agreement and a memorandum of understanding.
It looks like HMG and NHSE have driven a coach and horses through what is right, what is moral and what is ethical.
In their scramble to reach BoJo’s meaningless recruitment target of 50,000 nurses by 2025, they’ve done a deal.
Hampshire FT is imbroglio in recruiting 100 experienced Nepalese nurses and bringing them to the UK.
Why them?
Because it is near Aldershot and Aldershot was the home of the British Army and the base for the Gurka Brigade.
Ab-Fab star Joanna Lumley fought HMG, to ‘pay a debt of honour’ to allow retiring Gurkas and families, to stay in the UK.
There is a strong Nepalese community in the area. About 8,000 former Gurka soldiers and their families have since moved to Britain.
In fact without them, in Farnborough and Aldershot, no busses would move, no cleaning would be cleaned, no security would be secure, no taxis to get you home and no supermarket would have its shelves stacked.
Locals call Aldershot, ‘little Kathmandu’ and for many it is a miserable life.
If the British Gurkha Welfare Society is to be believed, Lumley’s campaign has been a disaster, resulting in thousands of elderly and infirm Gurkha pensioners – most unable to speak English – living in poor accommodation and relying on state benefits to survive.
There are appalling nurse shortages in Nepal and NHSE plans to bring 10,000 nurses here, over the next five years.
An International Labour Organisation report points out;
‘…there [are no] policies in Nepal to govern and manage the migration of health workers.’
This shameful plan may help the local hospital with some language and custom problems.
It may help some young people start a new life here.
But, it won’t help the Nepalese people to develop their thread-bare healthcare system.
And…
… it won’t help NHSEngland. Because…
…you can’t build a reputation on what you are going to do…
… but you can lose it on what you’ve done.
News and Comment from Roy Lilley
Contact Roy – please use this e-address roy.lilley@nhsmanagers.net
Reproduced at thetrainingnet.com by kind permission of Roy Lilley.
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