The Chairman Joint Health Workers Union (JOHESU) in Kano State, Murtala Umar, has lamented over the inadequate training of health workers and lack of PPEs to properly combat the COVID-19 pandemic in the state.
Umar expressed his concerns on Thursday during an interview on Channels Television breakfast programme, Sunrise Daily.
He said training of health workers in the state started a few days ago leaving the workers to learn in the heat of the pandemic.
According to him, these inadequacies have exposed health workers to COVID-19 infection.
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“We do not have an adequate workforce. The training just started within the crisis. This shows that we are not prepared for this kind of situation.
“You need to have trained these health workers a long time ago. I just received information that the training has been going on just for the last two days.
“This should have come a lot earlier than now because when you are in a crisis, you are disorganised. However, we are happy that our members are benefiting from the training,” he said.
Umar, therefore, called on the Federal Government to come to the aid of health workers in Kano State. He added that donations made by philanthropists should be channelled to getting more materials for Kano health workers.
“This disease is a novel disease. Globally, health workers get infected. Everybody is exposed. I know the state coordinators are doing their best but they can only give what they have.
“I am concerned about the Federal Government, all these donations why not put the monies in the system so that we can have more materials and protect our members,” he added.
Mr. Umar had earlier revealed that 168 health workers had been exposed to the virus at the Aminu Kano Teaching Hospital (AKTH).
Health workers numbering 14 – seven nurses, five medical laboratory scientists, one medical record officer, and cleaner were reported to have tested positive to the virus.
Umar in the interview lamented further that the situation has gone worse with some workers threatening to down their tools.
“In the last two weeks, we had to calm our members because the PPEs were not available and they were threatening to down their tools. Even now, there are some sections of the hospital that are not working because they feel that they are not well protected.
“This shows that some of the items are still inadequate, he said.
The JOHESU chairman insisted that more donations should be made to equipping health workers, particularly, those in Kano State.
