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Sources within the nursing sector told this publication many of them are home instead of at work as the Nursing and Midwifery Council of Botswana (NMCB) is reluctant to issue them practising licenses despite the plea from ministry officials and union leaders.
According to Botswana Nurses Union’s (BONU) vice president, Vusi Phela, nurses renewed licences late due to a change in the system that brought about confusion within the profession.
“The nurses ended up paying late and were told they would be penalised despite efforts to show that it was not deliberate. We spoke to Dr (Patrick) Masokwane to intervene as he had written to Botswana Health Professionals Council (BHPC) to have health workers renew their licenses without penalties, but he told us that the NMCB Registrar refused,” he said. Phela said nurses pay P50 per qualification and the penalty is P1,300. He said they have more than 200 nurses who had found themselves in the situation.
MmegiOnline has seen a memo from MOHW instructing BHPC registrar to waive penalties for health professionals who registered late in the effort to boost staff in the fight against coronavirus.
Botswana Land Board Local Authorities and Health Workers Union on April 1 wrote to government,
MoHW and Registrar NMCB stating that some nurses could not manage with renewal of their licenses only to be told the registrar was unavailable or the system was down. BLLAHWU secretary general Ketlhalefile Motshegwa also bemoaned in the letter that some District Health Management Teams (DHMT) sends such workers home and record them as absent from duty. He called on the authorities to facilitate assistance to concerned officers for renewal of licenses.
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On another sad note nurses are disconcerted after government failed to provide transport during the lockdown. Nurses believe arrangements could have been made as not all of them use or own cars to travel to work. Some nurses travel more than 50km to work and today they had to succumb to horror as some walked for quite significant distances to get to work due to unavailable public transport.
FRANCISTOWN: Tonota police have dismissed a circulating audio recording claiming an outbreak of coronavirus at a Zezuru homestead in Semotswane, near Tonota, saying it is false, misleading and malicious.
Tonota Police Station commander, superintendent Oteng Ngada told MmegiOnline today that, “We have seen and heard the audio and it’s just false. We are investigating the source that circulated that malicious audio, which has sent Semotswane and the rest of the country in a state of panic”.
Ngada was steadfast that as the police, they never attended any report pertaining to a family that chose to hide one of their own who allegedly died from a coronavirus-related ailment as the audio claimed.
Greater Francistown District Health Management Team (DHMT) co-coordinator, Rose Munyere confirmed to have listened to the audio, which has since gone viral on social media
“We have seen the audio as the DHMT and as we speak, it is subject to our investigations and our team is on the ground at Semotswane as we want to get to the bottom of the matter,” Munyere said, indicating that they have combed through Semotswane and other areas in the neighbourhood so as to leave no stone unturned.
Since the audio has implicated a lot more people, the Francistown DHMT has widened its net of investigations as the audio suggests a serious health scare in the coronavirus lockdown.
All of Botswana's parliamentarians including president Mokgweetsi Masisi will be quarantined for 14 days and tested for the coronavirus, after a health worker screening politicians for the virus herself tested positive.
The health worker had checked the temperatures of some of the MPs on Wednesday during a special sitting of parliament, which was called to debate a proposal by Mr Masisi to extend a state of emergency to six months.
Lemogang Kwape, the Health Minister, told MPs on Thursday that the health worker had tested positive for Covid-19 overnight, one of seven new confirmed cases that brought the total in the southern African country to 13.
Botswana: 24 of Siviya COVID-19 Suspects Test Negative
Masunga — A total of 24 contacts of the COVID-19 Siviya patient have tested negative for COVID-19.
North East District Health Management Team (DHMT) coordinator, Ms Rodah Phindela stated that so far they had managed to trace 36 contacts of the 34-year-old man from Siviya village in the North East District.
Ms Phindela said they were awaiting results of the 12 remaining contacts who were still in quarantine. She added that most of the contacts were the patient's family members, some health workers, police officers and members of the community.
Tracing continues to establish all possible contacts; she said, adding that they were still investigating to find out if he had visited some other people in other locations out of Siviya.
FRANCISTOWN: Tshesebe Police Station commander, superintendent Amos Kekgathetse has said that they have quarantined 12 Batswana, who were travelling from Zimbabwe through Ramokgwebana border.
When speaking to MmegiOnline Kekgathetse said that the 12 individuals comprising six women and men are currently placed on a 14-day mandatory quarantine at Stop Over Motel in Tshesebe village.
He said: “Since 27th April, 2020, we continued to receive a number of Batswana travelling from Zimbabwe who are coming back to their place of residence for different reasons. Majority of them reasoned that they came back so that they can go back to work”.
While Botswana continues its brave fight against Covid-19, the nationwide lockdown imposed to stop the virus from spreading has come at a cruel cost to the country’s poorer citizens.
This is especially evident in Francistown’s Block One location where desperate residents are growing hungrier by the day as The Voice’s CHRISTINAH MOTLHABANE discovered when she visited the area on Wednesday.