Gweru clinics face staff crisis

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GWERU City Council-run clinics are facing a serious shortage of nursing staff and this is affecting effective service delivery, a senior council official has revealed.

GWERU City Council-run clinics are facing a serious shortage of nursing staff and this is affecting effective service delivery, a senior council official has revealed.

STEPHEN CHADENGA OWN CORRESPONDENT

The council’s acting director of health services Christopher Ruwodo said the city’s clinics were facing a human resource deficiency despite servicing a huge part of Gweru’s population. Ruwodo told journalists during a tour of the clinics renovated by Unki Mine that Mkoba 1 Clinic had half of the required nursing staff.

“Currently, Mkoba 1 Clinic has a staff complement of 12 nurses yet we need 22. Unki Mine did a great job in refurbishing the infrastructure at our clinics, but we still face a shortage of staff,” Ruwodo said.

He, however, revealed that council would soon open the maternity wing at Mkoba 1 Clinic which had been closed as a result of a depleted resource base. Renovations which included repainting, tiling and re-roofing of the buildings were carried out by Unki Mine at Mkoba 1 Clinic, Mkoba 13 Polyclinic and Ascot Isolation Hospital at a cost of $105 000 as part of its corporate social responsibility.