There’s is an epidemic sweeping this country that needs to be nipped in the bud. No, it is not HIV, Ebola or even malaria.
It is a silly negativity, a deep malaise characterised by endless criticism of our institutions of state, by our young. This disease seems to have permeated everywhere. Self-hate has become a fad, and making outrageous allegations with no basis, no iota of truth or even logic has become the norm.
Let me give you just two samples from today.
"If Ebola were to enter Kenya the speed of transmission would be fast. Just one sick person on a bus towards Nairobi could infect several hundred people along the journey, and when in the city they could infect thousands more. We are a nation totally unprepared to handle an epidemic. "
[I][B]@MortyTuumbo
“Let’s all pray , If Ebola strikes then Kenya sijui tutahamia wapi… most of our hospitals are just buildings with no medicines etc …
They are just an avenue for county govts to loot funds…public healthcare is long dead”[/B][/I]
@Shegaj
Take the comments of the first poster. Why would the spread of Ebola, were it to reach Kenya, be faster than say Sierra Leone or Liberia? How would one sick person infect several hundreds while confined to a bus? And how would they then infect thousands in the city? IN OTHER WORDS, WHAT EPIDEMIOLOGICAL MODEL ARE THESE OUTRAGEOUS ALLEGATIONS BASED ON?
Take the comments of the second poster. Kenya has one of the best health facilities in Africa, which is why our maternal mortality is among the lowest in the region. Our HIV care is excellent, and this year we may reach universal ARV access. We have no polio or measles (North America does!) because our vaccinations programmes are spot on. Outside SA we have the greatest number of ICU beds in sub-Saharan Africa. Our research outfit, KEMRI is a WHO-recognised Biosafety Level 4 facility. How can one then make the outrageous statement that our hospitals are “just an avenue for county govts to loot funds…public healthcare is long dead” when the same facilities attend to 90% of the population?
Where am I going with all this, you may ask.
Criticism is great for a developing country like Kenya. When the political elite is as corrupt as ours is, it is the duty of every other Kenyan to complain, rant and vent. If we left these thieves to their devices they would loot the whole country.
BUT, let these criticisms, rants, and vents be grounded in reality. Let’s not make up nonsense and then think we are making any meaningful contribution to the conversation. To be blunt, saying “Kenya is doomed”, “Kenya was better under the colonialists”, “Our public healthcare is long dead” endlessly, as I see some people here do, is lazy baboonish shit. It is meaningless. It’s Kajwang singing “mapambano” - basically thoughtless sloganeering. It is not very intelligent.
True, Kenya is in a bad way. We could be doing way, way, way better, and the way to do that is to make the right diagnoses to our problems so that we can make the right treatments.
Let me end with a fact that most of you blithely ignored the other day; the budgets of Uganda, Tanzania, and Burundi are together LESS than Kenya’s. There’s a very good reason for that, and one of them is not stupid posturing and meaningless debate.
Let’s have some respect for our country, even as we ask our leaders for more.
Asanteni.