The Sunday News
Rutendo Nyeve, Sunday News Reporter
THE National University of Science and Technology (Nust) Medical School has declared its readiness to take over operations at Ekusileni Hospital after their initial plans had to be deferred after the hospital was declared a National Covid-19 isolation centre.
The institution which is run by the National Social Security Authority (NSSA) with Nust providing technical expertise got Cabinet approval in 2020 for it to be transformed into a specialist teaching research hospital under the university.
A brainchild of the late Vice-President Dr Joshua Mqabuko Nkomo, Ekusileni was built in 2001 as a specialist hospital. While the facility lay idle for years, the advent of the Covid-19 pandemic saw the facility being designated as a Covid-19 treatment facility hence putting on hold NUST’s arrangement to run the facility.
Speaking to Sunday News, NUST Medical School Executive Dean, Professor Elopy Sibanda said they await approval from authorities after they gave preference to the Covid-19 emergency.
“The project (Ekusileni specialist teaching research hospital) is in two phases. The first phase is that the hospital was requested to be a Covid-19 treatment centre. So you cannot have a Covid-19 treatment centre and a routine training facility housed under the same facility.
“Hence the University gave way to an emergency which was Covid-19. So the process of transitioning from that emergency to the usual specialist treatment will be finalised once the emergency is declared gone. We are waiting for the principals to tell us that the emergency is now over then we can run the hospital,” said Prof Sibanda.
The state-of-the-art facility is set to provide an opportunity for students to undertake the necessary training and cutting-edge health research, while providing a service to the nation.
Prof Sibanda reiterated the need to have specialist doctors saying the facility will come in handy in achieving this goal.
“We need specialists and not only general doctors as a country. That is why we have Ekusileni Hospital which is meant to be a training hospital which is earmarked to do various specialists services like kidney transplant.
“So we are trying to capitalise on the experience of Iranians and others to be able to bring in specialists in our country so that we do not have to go out of the country for treatment. Our students are very brilliant all they lack are specialist training expertise. We are ready to run and train specialists doctors. However, we need support in terms of equipment and expertise,” said Prof Sibanda.
The state-of-the-art medical facility whose construction was completed in 2001, operated for just seven months before it was closed in 2004 after it was discovered that the acquired equipment worth millions of dollars, was obsolete.
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