Botswana President declares health emergency in supply shortage | Botswana

The President of Botswana declared a public health emergency due to a shortage of essential medicines and equipment, a downturn in the global diamond market, with U.S. aid cuts hurting the country’s financial situation.

Announced after the Ministry of Health suspended non-emergency surgery on August 4 illustrate There are no medications for high blood pressure, diabetes, cancer, asthma and eye conditions in the country, as well as supplies of drugs including bandages and sutures, as well as sexual and reproductive health.

President Duma Boko said in a televised speech on Monday night that the country’s medical supply chain had failed as he announced 250 million pra (£13.8 million) for funding for emergency drugs, which will be supervised by the military.

Boko blames the National Procurement Agency Central Medical Store (CMS), which he said in turn is blamed on middlemen, with rising drug prices in southern African countries, with a population of about 2.5 million and is the world’s largest diamond producer.

“Current prices are usually exaggerated five to 10 times. Under current economic conditions, this situation is unsustainable.”

Boko, who beat the party in sixty years of the general election last November, said CMS quoted a year worth of Pula, a year that Botswana needed. Meanwhile, a new emergency task force received less than 80 million offers.

Thabo Seleke, a lecturer at the University of Botswana, said CMS suffered from dysfunction, inertia, unfinished reform assurance and corruption allegations, adding: “The Auditor General reports every year, … which… marks incomplete procurement records, lack of contracts and repeated delivery.”

The same is true of the horrible state of Botswana’s economy and public finance, which led to Boko’s victory last year. No sight for three years Diamond prices are lowAccording to the book, it accounts for 25% of Botswana’s GDP, one-third of government revenue and 80% of exports International Monetary Fund. The economy has shrunk Estimated 3% in 2024.

“The recession of diamonds is more persistent than diamond mining companies, and the state itself initially predicts it. As a result, the state is not ready for it.”

The Ministry of Health said in a statement on August 4 that it attributed to “private health care facilities and supplies, etc.”.

Botswana is a World Leaders in Solving HIV/AIDS. In 2000, one in eight of the children were born from HIV. In 2023, Less than 100. Earlier this year, it became the first country to get a high HIV-positive population Eliminate mother-to-child (or “vertical”) HIV transmission as a public health threat.

But while Botswana bought its own antiretroviral drugs to treat HIV, it has also been hit by cuts in U.S. aid announced in January. Before the cuts, the United States funded about a third of the country’s HIV response. According to UNAID – Get $55 million (£41 million) annually from the U.S. Presidential AIDS Relief Emergency Program (PEPFAR) to fight AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria through the Global Fund. Since then, some (but not all) have recovered global PEPFAR funding.