The Chinese Government awaits the design plan for a mega pharmaceutical warehouse from Zimbabwe to roll out funding for its construction.
By Kudakwashe Pembere
This was said by Chinese Ambassador to Zimbabwe Huang Ping while welcoming Chinese medical specialists to Zimbabwe on Tuesday.
He said they have secured funding for the building. “We are going to build the pharmaceutical warehouse in Zimbabwe. We have been trying to do this for two or three years. Now it’s the construction design which is yet to be finalized but the money is there. We can do it once we finalise the design,” said Ambassador Ping.
Ambassador Ping also revealed that Mahusekwa Hospital is under phase two of construction.
“And also we have built the Mahusekwa Hospital. I personally went there. Right now we are building the second phase. A team from china is constructing the second phase which will make the hospital better place for people in Chitungwiza. I ddnt realize how big Chitungwiza is when we drove in Mahusekwa. I thought it was going to be half an hour drive but actually it was over two hours. So this is a very big community with a large population. Mahusekwa Hospital has been there and now its under expansion,” he said.
Representing Health and Childcare permanent secretary Major General Gerald Gwinji, the ministry’s curative services director Dr Sydney Makarawu said storage space of drugs has been a major setback for them.
“One of the things that have been boggling us or bedevelling our healthcare system is where to store drugs in volumes which are easy to manage,” he said.
Dr Gwinji said the current NatPharm site is petite.
“And our current existing warehouse Natpharm is small and what we have been offered is going to be a huge building. A massive area and we hope that the Chinese government will give us drugs to also fill the warehouse. But indeed we are looking forward to this warehouse at some stage,” he said.
In January this year, Minister David Parirenyatwa said the Harare warehouse close to NatPharm would benefit customers in terms of high product availability, shorter delivery times and more efficient processes.
