South Darfur admits to not paying doctors

The Health Minister of South Darfur, Yagoub Ibrahim Eldmuki, has acknowledged the deterioration of medical services in Nyala Teaching Hospital and the acute shortage of doctors. The Minister also acknowledged that there are financial arrears with the payment of the doctors’ salaries.

An official of the State’s Ministry of Health, Ahmed Abdelrahman Mukhtar, reported in the newspapers that the state doctors’ arrears in the capital of South Darfur have amounted to SDG86,000 ($13,950).

The Nyala educational hospital’s director-general, Abu Midyan Abdelrahman, said that the hospital currently suffers a monthly deficit of SDG200,000 ($32,440) out of the total costs of SDG400,000 for running the hospital.

Midyan Abdelrahman said that the academic hospital “needs 136 general practitioers”. He explained that the hospital is currently providing services to more than oneand a half million people.

For the last 12 days, doctors have refused to work at night in protest against the non-payment of supplements by the state Health Ministry. It was reported that on Sunday that four pregnant women and two road accident victims died in the maternity ward of the hospital, as the doctors refused to treat them on time.