The Parliamentary Committee on Health has directed an immediate power audit at Mulago National Referral Hospital amid ongoing concerns about inconsistent power supply at the country's largest hospital.

Committee chairperson Charles Ayume (Koboko Municipality, NRM), expressed concerns about reports of insufficient power supply and frequent outages at Mulago, stating: "These disruptions not only create discomfort for patients but can also have serious consequences for their health, especially for those reliant on critical medical equipment."

The power audit, mandated by the committee, aims to assess the current state of Mulago's electrical infrastructure, identify any deficiencies, and recommend necessary improvements.

Ayume says the committee expects the audit to be completed within one month (March 10, 2024) and has emphasized the need for transparency throughout the process.

Mulago National Referral Hospital serves as a crucial healthcare facility for Ugandans and ensuring its proper functioning is vital.

Health ministry permanent secretary Dr Diana Atwine said the sector needs to explore more options with the guidance of the energy ministry since the issue has been long-standing.

According to Atwine, hospital equipment is not being utilised due to power issues: “Priority setting is very important. Surely, we can’t get loans to electrify the hospitals? You find that power fluctuates every day. It is on in the morning and off in the evening. People are in the middle of surgeries and power goes off”.

She added: “What is more important than life? Everyone knows that life has no spare and should be handled, we need to support each other and solve this issue”.

Power usage at Mulago Hospital
This power audit, ordered by the Parliamentary Committee on Health arose after the energy ministry presented a statement on the hospital utility bill arrears, where National Water and health ministry also appeared before the committee.

Energy ministry undersecretary Grace Tusiime lamented that they are underfunded.

“We have unfunded priorities that recur every year. There are costs of generation and distribution needed in order to continue handling our mandate. However, we are faced with a challenge where government agencies and hospitals are not promptly paying electricity bills,” she said.

According to Tusiime, this posses a big challenge since the ministry is already struggling with budget constraints.

For example, she noted that Mulago National Referral Hospital as per June 30, 2023, had an outstanding electricity bill arrears of shillings 1.3 billion. Currently, the arrears stand at shillings 4.5 billion as per January 31, 2024.

“To me, we need to analyse the whole issue and deal with the cause. Because to be able to do the planning and accountability, the process has to come from the user’s side,” she said.

If by June 30, 2023, Mulago Hospital had an outstanding electricity bill arrears of shillings 1.3 billion and current the arrears standing at shillings 4.5 billion, it means that on average, within the last seven months, the hospital has consumed electricity worth shillings 3.2 billion.

On average, this means that Mulago Hospital consumes electricity worth over shillings 457 million per month and shillings 15 million daily in electricity bills alone.

Margaret Ayebare (Mbarara District Woman MP, NRM) queried whether there are leakages and power thefts within the hospital premises that need to be investigated.

“Should I think that there are some leakages. Are we really using all this money per month? Could there be some leakages in the hospitals and power thefts,” she said.

The commissioner for rural electrification, Eng. Abdon Atwine, said it is the reason they also need to look at the hospital management to be able to investigate the illegalities and leakages.

“We can do the power supply audits to ascertain the actual costs. However, we are also looking at using alternative power sources which are already in arrangements to be able to tackle the issues of power supply in hospitals,” Abdon said, adding that already, a number of the hospitals have special lines for power connections.

Medical equipment destroyed
According to Atwine, medical equipment worth millions have been destroyed due to unstable power supply.

She said other equipment is lying idle in hospitals with no power connection. She wondered why there are power lines passing through a radius of about 500 metres of the hospitals, yet the facilities are not electrified.

“Whenever we approach the energy ministry for a solution regarding these issues, they tell us to invest in stabilisers,” he said.