Namibia is set to construct a district hospital in Windhoek with a capacity of 300 beds.
This move is expected to relieve the pressure on the country’s oldest health facilities, Katutura and Central intermediate hospitals, which are overwhelmed with patients.
“This is aimed at improving access to public healthcare, in the same vein signifying the importance of rolling out the Universal Health Coverage (UHC) Framework policy that will lay the foundation for the provision of access to quality and affordable healthcare services,” President Hage Geingob said on Thursday during his State-of-the-National Address.
“The first four Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) of Ending Poverty and Hunger, and ensuring access to Health and Education for All, are inter-dependent. The attainment of our national and global goals depends primarily on maintaining healthy minds, in healthy bodies,” Geingob added.
He hinted that the government was still proceeding with its plans to introduce UHC policy for the country as part of efforts to provide Namibians with improved access to quality healthcare services.
“Government spends close to 20% of its budget on the public health system, which serves 80% of the total population. To this end, the Universal Health Coverage policy that is being developed aims to ensure all people have access to quality health care services without constraint,” he said.
This comes as the Health and Social Services Ministry was allocated N$9.7 billion for the 2023/24 financial year, and over N$29.4 billion over the Medium-Term Expenditure Framework.
Within that allocation, more than N$700 million is meant for investments and renovations of health facilities as well as recruitment of medical personnel, acquisition of pharmaceuticals and ambulances.
Namibia currently has 1,150 outreach points, 27 primary clinics, 44 health centres, 30 district hospitals and only five referral hospitals, as per the ministerial statistics.
Namibia, although having an international ranking of above 70% as a provider of healthcare services, is still faced with a number of challenges, such as shortage of medicines and medical equipment, shortage of staff, dilapidated hospitals, as well as inadequate health facilities, which forces many of the inhabitants to track long distances to acquire such service.
