Current:Home > BackKenya ends arrangement to swap doctors with Cuba. The deal was unpopular with Kenyan doctors-DB Wealth Institute B2 Expert Reviews
Kenya ends arrangement to swap doctors with Cuba. The deal was unpopular with Kenyan doctors
View Date:2024-12-23 15:37:02
NAIROBI, Kenya (AP) — Kenya’s government announced Wednesday it would not be renewing a 6-year-old deal that saw Cuban doctors employed in Kenya while those from the East African country travelled to Cuba for specialized training.
The program was unpopular with Kenya’s main doctors union, partly because the Cuban doctors received more than double the average salary of their Kenyan counterparts. Critics argued that money would be better spent on Kenya’s medical infrastructure and on its own doctors.
Health Minister Nakumicha Wafula announced the end of the Cuba deal at a meeting with health industry workers in the capital, Nairobi, and was met with applause and shouts of “yes, yes!” Wafula said the ministry would ensure that the country’s health workers are “well taken care of.”
Under the deal signed in 2017, 50 Kenyans were sent to Cuba to undergo specialized training, while 100 Cubans were dispatched to county level hospitals in Kenya to help improve services.
The move was heavily criticized at the time by legislators and the Kenya Medical Practitioners, Pharmacists and Dentists Union, which said it was a waste of resources when the country was struggling with thousands of unemployed doctors and specialists.
The union said the money used to pay the Cuban doctors’ high salaries could have been used to hire Kenyan doctors or to buy medical equipment for local hospitals which often lack basic facilities and medicines.
Kenya’s Salaries and Renumeration Commission has said that each Cuban doctor was paid a monthly salary of about $5,300, while local doctors in the same category received between $1600 and $2300. The Cuban doctors also had better travel and housing allowances
Doctors and nurses Kenya have often gone on strike demanding better pay and working conditions.
veryGood! (5934)
Related
- Walmart Planned to Remove Oven Before 19-Year-Old Employee's Death
- It's official: Taylor Swift's Eras Tour makes history as first to earn $1 billion
- Jerry Maguire's Jonathan Lipnicki Looks Unrecognizable Giving Update on Life After Child Stardom
- Hanukkah symbols, songs suddenly political for some as war continues
- 'The Penguin' spoilers! Colin Farrell spills on that 'dark' finale episode
- Could Trevor Lawrence play less than a week after his ankle injury? The latest update
- Air Force grounds entire Osprey fleet after deadly crash in Japan
- Use these tech tips to preserve memories (old and new) this holiday season
- Wheel of Fortune Contestant Goes Viral Over His Hilariously Wrong Answer
- Wisconsin university system reaches deal with Republicans that would scale back diversity positions
Ranking
- Alexandra Daddario shares first postpartum photo of baby: 'Women's bodies are amazing'
- How Gisele Bündchen Blocks Out the Noise on Social Media
- Oprah Winfrey Shares Insight into Her Health and Fitness Transformation
- Philanthropist MacKenzie Scott reveals the groups that got some of her $2.1 billion in gifts in 2023
- Donna Kelce Includes Sweet Nod to Taylor Swift During Today Appearance With Craig Melvin
- 1 member of family slain in suburban Chicago was in relationship with shooting suspect, police say
- Nashville Police investigation into leak of Covenant School shooter’s writings is inconclusive
- Man freed after 11 years in prison sues St. Louis and detectives who worked his case
Recommendation
-
World War II veteran reflects on life as he turns 100
-
Love Story Actor Ryan O’Neal Dead at 82
-
Pope Francis makes his first public appearances since being stricken by bronchitis
-
Fox snatcher: Footage shows furry intruder swiped cameras from Arizona backyard
-
Biden funded new factories and infrastructure projects, but Trump might get to cut the ribbons
-
FDA approves first gene-editing treatment for human illness
-
Hunter Biden indicted on tax crimes by special counsel
-
2 nurses, medical resident injured in attack at New Jersey hospital, authorities say