Githunguri MP Gathoni Wamuchomba has defended the catholic church against an onslaught from a section of legislators following their press conference on Thursday, November 14, 2024, where they called out the government.

Speaking during a live TV interview on Monday, November 18, 2024, Wamuchomba said the Catholic church had all the rights to speak about healthcare as they own and run a significant chunk of the health facilities and schools in the country.

“The catholic church is very viable to speak about education and health because they are one of the greatest stakeholders,” Wamuchomba said.

Wamuchomba indicated that close to 30 per cent of the health facilities in the country were owned by the church translating to 69 hospitals, 117 health centres, 251 dispensaries and 14 medical training colleges.

“Approximately 30 per cent of all healthcare facilities in Kenya are run and owned by the catholic. They own 69 hospitals, run 117 health centres, 14 medical training colleges and 251 dispensaries,” Wamuchomba said.

Adding: “When they say that the Social Health Authority (SHA) does not work, they are the right stakeholders to tell us the real scenario on the ground.”

NHIF outstanding debts

A majority of the private hospitals are owed by the government up to Ksh19 billion in unpaid debt from the defunct National Hospital Insurance Fund (NHIF) which was transitioned to SHA.

President William Ruto on Saturday, November 16, 2024, said that Ksh5 billion of the debt had been disbursed and another Ksh2.5 billion would be released towards the hospitals owed.

In their latest health report conducted between August 14-29, 2023, the government owed 47 health facilities in the country while 46 per cent were run by private players.

MoH 2023 research

The research which involved some 564 enumerators and was done in all the 47 counties concluded that less than 40 per cent of all the health facilities in the country offer maternity services.

Further, out of the facilities which offer maternity services, only 5 per cent had all the required equipment to perform comprehensive maternity services.

Also, only 18 per cent of the facilities conducting maternity services were in a position to perform cesarian section procedures.

Of the 14,883 facilities surveyed, only 13 per cent of them offered dental services while only 2 per cent offered renal services. Similarly, only 5.8 per cent of the health facilities are capable of handling accident and emergency services.

Of note is that only 12 of the 47 counties had the right number of healthcare workforce and the required balance of nurses, clinical officers and doctors. The research found that Kenya has at least 197,000 health workers.