By Mohamed K. Turay
Health Alert-Sierra Leone, a Civil Society Organisation that is promoting social justice and better health service delivery, has recently organized a one-day consultative meeting with stakeholders including Civil Society Organizations, the media, health service providers among others.
The meeting, which took place at the Civil Service Training College in Freetown, was aimed at enlightening partners on the PAF/Global Financing Facility in Sierra Leone.
The Executive Director of Health Alert-Sierra Leone, Victor Lansana Koroma, stated that his organization was advocating for social justice and accountability on the delivery of health services across the country.
Mr Koroma said it was disappointing that as a focal person for Sierra Leone, most Civil Society Organizations know little or nothing about how resources were distributed; what was happening within the health facilities; how the health facilities were distributed, and the reasons why they were unable to ask pertinent questions and contribute meaningfully. He added that the meeting seeks to address such gaps.
He said as a focal person, he was tasked with the duty of presenting a concept note on how the health facilities were distributed which was widely accepted and approved by the World Bank during one of the conferences he attended.
The Executive Director of Health Alert-Sierra Leone said the project was operating in five districts including Tonkolili, Bonthe, Pujehun, Western Rural and Kailahun with Coordinators who would be presented with activities along with CSOs.
Health Alert’s Programme Manager, Dalton John during his presentation, outlined the main reasons for the country’s high rate of maternal mortality deaths. He noted that these were as a result of the attitudes of health workers towards patients, lack of basic health facilities and the failure of the government to allocate a special budget towards reproductive health.
He said, “the death rates are worrying and need to be reduced”; citing also the fear by most patients to access health facilities as a result of the response by health care workers.
Dalton John presented a grim picture of the country’s health sector which he said required urgent attention, especially as other countries had moved far ahead of Sierra Leone.
According to him, “the services may be there but if the performance of the health care provider is poor there will always be a problem, a sad development that has frustrated mothers from accessing health centres”.