By Sulaiman Aruna Sesay
The Ministry of Health, on Wednesday 24th April, 2024, issued out a press release raising their awareness of the current electricity challenges faced by hospitals across the country. The nationwide electricity difficulties have been felt in health facilities. The hospitals have traditionally relied on diesel-powered generators, which are expensive to run and can account for over 20% hospital expenditure.
The press release clearly stated that, over the years the MoH with the support from its partners has worked diligently to resolve the problem of power outages in health facilities by transitioning to reliable, environmentally friendly and efficient solar alternatives. According to the release, solar power plants have been installed at 6 major government hospitals across the country, with 11 more to be installed by the end of this year. “300 peripheral health units will have solar plants installed by the end of 2024,” they noted.
In December 2023, the MoH and its partners established 300KW solar solutions at the Princess Christian Maternity Hospital (PCMH) and Ola During Children’s Hospital (ODCH) as supplemental energy solutions. This solar plant is not enough to exclusively power both hospitals at 1.3MW but was meant to serve as a backup supply to the national grid. If efficiently used, the solar plant can cover electricity needs at the hospital during power outages, especially for life-savings emergencies.
It was reported that, to improve the situation of frequent power outages across public health facilities, the MoH is putting in place the following: The MoH is in urgent discussion with the Ministry of Energy to prioritize energy supply to all major government hospitals by installing dedicated power lines to these facilities; robust resource mobilization and advocacy to complete solar plant installation for all public health facilities across the country, proper operational mechanism for these solar plant installations in hospitals to ensure appropriate use for quality health service delivery.
For PCMH specifically, the MoH has facilitated an engagement between solar experts and PCMH hospital leadership to ensure the efficient use of solar power to maximize coverage during power outages. The MoH is also ensuring a backup generator and fuel supply are available in the event that both the solar power and national grid supplies are off.
The MoH take into cognisant the leadership challenges at PCMH hospital and has been putting measures in place for the past month to address them. According to the release, one such measure is the official appointment of Dr. Amadu Sesay, who has been acting as Medical Superintendent (MS) at PCMH for the past one month, to continue to act in this capacity. The Ministry is very grateful to Dr. Sesay for graciously consenting to serve in this position and will support him to work at full potential.
The MoH wishes to express its sincere condolences to the families and loved ones of those who lost their lives amid these challenges. The MoH also thank and appreciate all health workers across the country, for their efforts and dedication towards providing qualified healthcare for all Sierra Leoneans. According to the release, despite the challenges faced by health sector, they want to reiterate their commitment to work with all stakeholders to ensure every Sierra Leonean has access to quality health care.
