Speaking during the Mashujaa celebrations ceremony, president Uhuru Kenyatta announced establishment of Kenya Biovax Limited to manufacture Covid-19 vaccines.
Uhuru said this will end dependence on vaccine donations. The President directed the Ministry of Health to operationalize the facility for the eventual manufacturing of homespun doses by Easter of 2022.
“If there is anything, we have learnt from the Covid-19 pandemic is the essence of self-reliance. As the first step towards this goal, we have established a company to facilitate this venture in the name of Kenya Biovax Limited,”
Uhuru further directed the National Treasury to allocate Sh3.2 billion for construction of 50 Level 3 hospitals. He noted that in Nairobi, the government has constructed 15 level two and three hospitals in various informal settlements, through the Nairobi Metropolitan Services (NMS).He further noted that the transformation of the health sector is one of the phenomenal testimonies of how we turned Covid-19 obstacles into opportunities.
On devolution of the health sector, the president noted that the government has put in place a comprehensive nationwide program to upgrade selected hospitals in all the 47 counties through provision of specialized, modern, state-of-the-art medical, diagnostic and critical care equipment.
“We have the Managed Equipment Services (MES) project, whose objective is to improve access to quality specialized healthcare services throughout the country,”
Through the program, the government identified and equipped 115 hospitals with various theatre equipment, 101 hospitals with radiological and imaging equipment, 14 facilities with ICU equipment and 54 facilities installed and commissioned renal equipment including dialysis machines.
“Through this massive investment, 628,821 people have benefited from theatre services, 385,587 people benefited from dialysis out of the 577 dialysis machines installed, 23,574 people benefited from ICU services and over 5.7 million people have been served using the 22 MRI machines, 214 X-ray machines, 83 CT scanners and 229 ultra-sound equipment since 2016,”
According to the government, the heavy investment has benefited more than six million patients and saved Kenya Sh131.5 billion.
Edited by: Chepkosgei Jedidah