In the current financial year, the government has allocated funds to renew contracts for 8,570 health workers under the Universal Health Coverage (UHC) program.
Additionally, the budget has been set aside to support 100,000 community health promoters.
Speaking during the homecoming and thanksgiving service for Tongaren MP and Ford Kenya Secretary General, John Murumba Chikati, CS for Health Nakhumicha Wafula revealed these initiatives.
Counties in June began the process of renewing contracts for UHC staff employed by the government under the UHC Cohort 1 program.
In a letter from Council of Governors CEO Mary Mwiti dated June 21, all county public service boards were directed to commence the process of contract renewal for another three years.
The approval followed intense lobbying by governors to avert potential disruption of health services in the counties following the expiry of the contracts on May 31.
Three years ago, the national government employed doctors, nurses, clinicians, midwives, and health records officers and deployed them to different counties on three-year contracts.
Health workers employed in the second batch (UHC Cohort 2) revealed that their contracts expire in September this year.
The Kenya Union of Clinical Officers (KUCO) and other medical sector unions had threatened to go on strike over the expired contracts in a letter dated May 15.
“Despite our several efforts to have these officers absorbed by the government into the permanent and pensionable establishment to attract and retain these staff for improved service delivery, the government has continued to turn a deaf ear to both our plea and the law,” KUCO said.
