Medical engineers have welcomed the increase in the allocation for the Managed Equipment Services (MES) project for the new Financial Year 2023/24 from Sh5.2 billion to Sh5.9 billion.

The engineers expressed optimism that the budgetary allocation will be pumped into revamping the dilapidated biomedical engineering workshops, employing more biomedical engineers and purchasing accessories for the equipment among other requirements.

While the allocation points to a new lease of life for the project—which recently a section of governors threatened to end—the Association of Medical Engineers (AMEK) sees this as an opportunity to push for recognition of numerous advantages of this cadre in the delivery of healthcare in Kenya.

“It’s a good initiative that the government has taken; however, there are a number of grey areas that need to be considered when deploying the funds,” AMEK Secretary General, Eng Millicent Alooh (pictured) said yesterday while reacting to last Thursday’s Treasury’s budget estimates’ proposals for the controversial project.

She called on the Ministry of Health to utilise the funds well to address the shame of rusting equipment valued at billions of shillings of taxpayers’ money.

And as hospitals continue to suAccording to AMEK, Kenya has slightly over 600 employed Biomedical engineers, way below the World Health Organisation’s (WHO) requirement of 7,000.