DAR ES SALAAM: TANZANIA has made remarkable strides over the past four years under President Samia Suluhu Hassan’s leadership, thanks to significant investments by the government in improving healthcare services across the country.
Highlighting key achievements under President Samia’s tenure,
Chief Government Spokesperson and Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Information, Arts, Culture and Sports, Gerson Msigwa said that the government has constructed 129 new hospitals in every district council nationwide.
Mr Msigwa was speaking to journalists yesterday in Dar es Salaam, briefing on President Samia’s official visit to Tanga and the recently concluded G25 African Cof- fee Summit.
He stressed on a series of development projects being undertaken by the govern- ment and President Samia’s four -year achievements across various sectors, including healthcare services.
“During this four-year period, the government has built 129 new district hospitals in various councils and now every council has a hospital.
In many areas, citizens are expressing their gratitude to the President for the substantial reforms in healthcare service provi- sion,” Mr Msigwa.
He said the government has renovated about 367 health centres and finalised the construction of 980 dipensaries that had stalled, including attending to citizens’ concerns.
Mr Msigwa said that during the four years of the sixth-phase government, a significant investment of about 1.298tri/- in medicine and modern medical equipment has been recorded (including purchase of x-rays, Ultrasound Machines and CT scans).
“The budget for medicines has increased to 239bn/-. This is specifically for medicines. Previously, the budget for medicines and other medi- cal supplies was combined. Now this amount is solely for medicines. When you include the budget for medical supplies, which has now reached 181bn/-, you can see how much our budget has in- creased,” he said.
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The Chief Government Spokesperson said, in four years, about 677 dispensaries, 425 health centres and 100 hospitals have been supplied with medical supplies including medical oxygen gas equipment and ambulances.
Mr Msigwa asserted that, under Dr Samia’s four -year leadership, emergence services have been strengthened by the government, explaining that during the period under review, about 86 Emergence Medical Department (EMD) facilities and 30 Intensive Care Units (ICU) have been built with medical equipment availed.
He said during the four-year period, 21 oxygen generation plants have been installed in hospitals, bringing the total number to 129.
“As you can remember during the Covid-19 pandemic we faced a significant chal- lenge because people needed a lot of oxygen gas service and its availability was costly, making it difficult for many to afford.
Now we have begun installing oxygen plants in our hospitals and already, over the past four years, we have installed 21 plants so far,” said Mr Msigwa.
For the period of four years, he said 382 ambulances have been purchased and 210 cars for coordination and 540 motorcycles for outreach services have been allocated in all district hospitals.
