Africa-Press – Uganda. Whereas all the materials needed to construct modern houses have always existed in Uganda, we stayed in primitive dwellings for a very long time.
The point here is that it is not enough to simply have ingredients; we also need the capacity to organise them into something useful.
Today, we find ourselves overwhelmed by Covid-19 despite having the requisite ingredients to mount a serious response. In this article, we look at some of the readily available elements that government can harness.
When this government came to power in 1986, it was faced with huge gaps in education and health with hardly any money. Unable to tackle these challenges alone, it partnered with and enabled the private sector to provide solutions.
This brilliant move resulted in a speedier improvement in health and education outcomes with the private sector offering the superior service. Indeed, whenever finances allow, we forego public facilities to educate or treat our loved ones at private ones.
However, when Covid-19 struck, government seemed to forget its own wisdom; it sought to monopolise the testing and treatment of Covid-19. That didn’t last long as government quickly became overwhelmed. Eventually, it had no choice but to bring the private sector on board. Consequently, access to testing improved drastically, with the private sector offering a more convenient and superior service. As competition among private actors soared, prices and services improved to the point that one can now have a laboratory sample picked from the comfort of their home! Access and quality of treatment also improved although affordability remains a challenge.
Nevertheless, imagine how much higher the death rate would be if only government facilities were allowed to treat Covid-19!Given such benefits of involving the private sector, one wonders why the government is monopolising the importation and distribution of vaccines.
If people are paying for tests and all manner of treatments, is it hard to imagine they can pay for a vaccine, something that is far more protective and cost-effective. Already we see many opting for treatment in private facilities, despite the existence of free government facilities.
Why can’t the private sector be allowed to attend to their vaccination needs as well? After all, it helps reduce the number of people that government must cater for.
Any concerns about quality control and assurance can be addressed through government oversight. It’s an approach we have used to enable the private sector manage other deadly or complicated diseases such as malaria, HIV, diabetes, and heart disease.
The second point relates to having multiple lines of treatment. In managing other deadly diseases, government has enabled flexibility by employing more than one line of therapy.
However, with Covid-19, it has restricted itself to one vaccine (AstraZeneca) yet more than one vaccine exists and some people are willing and capable of paying for alternatives. What happens then when we can’t access the AstraZeneca vaccine, as is the case now?
Shouldn’t we, like our comrades in Angola, be open to all approved vaccines?Granted, the Pfizer vaccine requires special cold storage requirements but Uganda already handles several drugs and biological materials that require similar storage. In other words, we already have the logistics capacity; we just need to re-organise and unleash it. If we need to borrow notes from similarly placed countries, we can benchmark Angola and Rwanda.
The point is – we have most of the materials and skills needed to mount a more effective response. Let us organise and unleash them with strict government oversight.
Mr Kibudde is a socio-political [email protected] Twitter: @kkaboggoza
