Uganda: Govt probes hospitals over coronavirus jabs

The Ministry of Health is investigating circumstances under which designated health facilities for COVID-19 vaccination are stopping the exercise at 2pm instead of the official time of 5pm.

This follows complaints from people who say they missed vaccinations because hospitals preferred to stop the exercise before the official time.

“For private health facilities, they can determine the time they will be vaccinating people because we do not pay their health workers to do the vaccination. But for government health facilities, we shall follow it up,” Dr Charles Olaro, the director of clinical services at Ministry of Health, said in an interview yesterday.

However, Mr Simon Sekamata, a health worker at Nsambya hospital, told this reporter they were only receiving 100 doses of the vaccine that get exhausted by 2pm.

“At first, we were had many doses and we would vaccinate up to 300 people per day. But Kampala Capital City Authority (KCCA) is currently giving us 100 doses of vaccines so those who come late often miss,” he said.

At Naguru hospital, a health worker, who preferred to call himself Brian, also said a few people come in the afternoon.

We were unable to reach Dr Dan Okello, the head of public health services at KCCA, for comments on why they were only giving 100 doses per hospital per day. But the head of immunisation programme at the Ministry of Health, Dr. Alfred Driwale, said they would engage the relevant officials to address the issue.

A total of 341,819 people have so far been vaccinated across the country.