Kenya’s public health sector is at risk of a collapse as a countrywide doctors’ strike stretches into the second month with no solution in sight, warns the national doctors’ union.

Davji Atellah, secretary general of the Kenya Medical Practitioners, Pharmacists and Dentists Union (KMPDU), said that health services had come to a near standstill due to a lack of medical personnel, equipment and medical supplies, after the union went on strike in mid-March.

“We have been giving minimal service during the period of the strike, including in critical care and emergency units in public hospitals, but that is now in jeopardy unless the government sits and talks with the doctors,” Atellah said.

He warned that non-emergency but essential services such as immunisation and maternal and child health could grind to a halt in many facilities.

The KMPDU, which represents over 7,000 members, is demanding the implementation of an agreement signed in 2017 to improve pay and conditions and recruit more doctors.

With talks so far failing to resolve the dispute, many patients, especially the poor, are left waiting for treatment.

Moses Othim had an accident last year and needs physiotherapy twice a week at the Kenyatta National Hospital, in Nairobi.

“I have made several trips to Kenyatta but got no services,” he told SciDev.Net.

“You go there and sit and wait. No one attends to you and no one tells you anything.

“It’s like we now go to hospital to die.”