High charges force patients to escape from Mulago women's hospital

Legislators sitting on the Public Accounts Committee of Parliament have been shocked to learn that Mulago Specialized Women and Neonatal Hospital that is highly subsidized by public funds continues to put a high charge on patients seeking services at the facility.

To the legislators, the high charge in this public facility has seen patients escape from the hospital for relatively cheap services in private facilities.

According to the information from the Mulago specialized Women and Neonatal Hospital, those seeking consultation at the facility under the category of silver the charges are shs50,000, shs 62,000 for gold, and shs 75000 for Platinum or presidential suit and shs73000 for non ugandans.

For the antenatal visits those seeking services under the category of silver each patient is charged shs450,000  for eight weeks, those under the category of the gold shs 650,000, shs800,000 for platinum and shs975000 for non Ugandans.

For neonatal services , each day, a  patient is charged shs50,000  under the category of silver, shs60,000 under the category of gold and  shs75,00o under the category of platinum and for immunization shs50,000  cuts across while   yellow fever is charged shs 100,000  across all the categories.

For the in-patients those under the category of silver are being charged shs80,000 per night for those under the category of silver, shs150,000  for those seeking services under the category of old and 500,000 shs for those under platinum category per night.

For the nurse care services under silver it's  shs40,000shs, shs50,000  for gold, and platinum goes for shs60,000 while doctors' care services under silver go for shs 60,000  per night, gold for shs 75,000 and for Platinum it is shs 90,000 per night.

For ICU services those seeking services under level one are being charged shs 300,000  per day and those under level two are being charged shs1 million  per week.

For the normal delivery those under the category of silver it's shs500,000, those under gold shs1 million and platinum is shs2.5 million .

For the  C-section those under silver are charged shs1.6 million , gold shs2.5 million and those under the platinum category are required to pay shs4 million .

The legislators were left astonished by  these high fees.

" Why should patients be paying all this much in a public hospital that is given tax payers money to run it's activities. I think this hospital is for the rich people only,"  Muwanga Kivumbi said.

"With these charges my voters in Bugisu can not afford these services, I think it's high time we consider allocating enough funds to this hospital such that people are given free services at this facility," another MP, Ignatius Mudimi said.

The Executive Director of the hospital Dr. Evelyn Nabunya said  in spite of the subsidies from government, the decision to have the charges at this facility was by the executive.