By Davis Masapula
Zomba, Mana: Zomba and Mangochi district hospitals will soon have oxygen plants in a quest to reduce cases of deaths related to lack of oxygen.
This was revealed Thursday in Zomba at a meeting organized by the department of Emergency and Critical Services in the ministry of health.
The meeting was aimed at disseminating two policy documents that the Ministry developed to change the systems of emergency care in the country.
Acting Chief of Emergency and Critical Care Services, Norman Lufesi said when COVID19 hit the country there was an outcry for oxygen.
Lufeni said almost all health facilities run out oxygen and this posed a danger to lives of most of the patients.
He said the situation forced management to relook at how emergency care services were being run and formulate the policy documents that would guide the operation of the emergency services in the country’s health facilities.
He said the establishment of oxygen plants in the two districts would serve more patients seeking oxygen attention.
“The importance of these oxygen plants is that they are going to be serving hospitals in the eastern for instance, Machinga and Balaka. We have deliberately chosen Zomba and Mangochi because these are our strategic health facilities,” said Lufesi.
He added, “Government was also planning to put up a Mannford system where they will put out gas cylinder outside the hospital to improve on safety and transported inside the hospital through pipes.”
Lufesi said Malawi as a country was doing quite in terms of emergency care services in general but he said more still need to be done.
“ What we also need to have are better emergency and treatment rooms, better health care workers and we make sure that medicines are available all the year,” said Lufesi
District Commissioner for Mangochi, Dr Raphael Piringu stressed the need to have oxygen plant as more people in the region were in dire need of it.
“We have seen a lot of patients in Mangochi dying because of lack of oxygen facilities and due to increase in population, it is necessary to have the plant,” Dr Piringu said
Emergency and critical care strategy plus oxygen road map where launched by the Ministry of health in December 2021.
