Scarce funding cripples service delivery in Kenyan hospital

St Luke’s Mission Nursing Home in Kilifi, in southeastern Kenya. PHOTO | KEVIN ODIT 

In Summary

• A public outcry forced the Kilifi County government to invest Ksh11 million in St Luke’s and it was reopened in February 2017, but with a skeleton staff of 19 out of the 106 at the time of the closure.

By VERAH OKEYO
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It is hard to believe that the now rusty iron hospital beds, dirty wards and the costly but run down equipment in the theatre as well as the intensive care unit were once the hallmark of St Luke’s Mission Nursing Home in Kilifi on Kenya's Coast.

The Kenya Medical Practitioners and Dentists Board closed the facility in April 2016 due to "lack of registration," a decision that interrupted learning at the hospital’s nursing school, which had more than 100 students, and rendered their tutors jobless while the management was left in a fix.

But those who were most affected by the closure were the residents. The hospital had unburdened them of hours of walking to seek healthcare, with the nearest affordable facility being some 20km away — the Mariakani Sub-County Hospital.  

St Luke’s Mission Nursing Home was established in 1927 by the Church Mission Society, but later changed hands, being taken over by the Anglican Church of Kenya.

Covering the larger disadvantaged parts of Kilifi, the facility began with missionary health workers. It grew steadily and at the time of its closure, it housed a theatre, three wards and a paediatric unit.

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