Mpilo deserves support

MPILO Central Hospital, the southern region’s largest referral health institution, will today hold an important donors’ conference in Bulawayo as it steps up efforts to restore the facility to its former glory.

MPILO Central Hospital, the southern region’s largest referral health institution, will today hold an important donors’ conference in Bulawayo as it steps up efforts to restore the facility to its former glory.

Donors would be presented with a long list of projects that the hospital aims to undertake as part of the rehabilitation.

They include the refurbishment of the student nurses’ home, staff residence, maternity theatre, intensive care unit, old mortuary, main casualty section, main kitchen, dental unit and the road network, among many others.

Hospital authorities are planning to embark on new projects such as the construction of a new administration block, a perimeter wall and procurement of ambulances and other equipment.

The donor conference would be attended by Health and Child Care minister David Parirenyatwa, among other government officials.

A report on the needs assessment has been circulating prior the conference and indications are that Mpilo would need in excess of $15,6 million to accomplish its ambitions plan.

The hospital’s administration has not sat on its laurels as evidenced by a number of fundraising initiatives that it has undertaken prior to the conference.

It is an open secret that the government of Zimbabwe is broke and the health sector has borne the brunt of the economic collapse of the last decade.

Other health centres have reacted to this by folding their hands and waiting for the government to find a solution to their mounting woes.

However, Mpilo has been mobilising the Bulawayo community to take ownership of the hospital and that initiative is already bearing fruit with various organisations adopting wards for rehabilitation.

The hospital has also received various other donations from organisations that have been impressed by the proactive approach taken by the authorities to solve the problems bedevilling the institution.

Bulawayo residents are currently taking part in the construction of a perimeter wall at Mpilo and these are some of the small ways the community is assisting in the efforts led by the hospital administration.

Donors would certainly be encouraged to lend their support to a community that is ready to help itself.

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