Beverly Bizeki
On November 14 of every year, the world commemorates diabetes day and this year’s commemorations were held under the theme ‘Access to diabetes care’, with the World Health Organization (WHO) highlighting the need for equitable access to essential care and raising awareness on how people with diabetes can minimize the risk of complications.
However, diabetes care seems not to be affordable to a number of people, and one patient Rugare Chinouya (not real name) a 48-year-old woman from Masvingo who was diagnosed with diabetes type 2 says drugs and maintaining the proper diet are some of the challenges she and other patients face in the journey after diagnosis.
For Chinouya, diabetes is a manageable disease but poor public health care services in the country have made it worse for people with diabetes as drugs are costly and the diet needed to manage the disease is costly too.
“My condition is almost always under check when I have all the drugs prescribed by the doctors but the challenge comes on some days when I run out of drugs and I am supposed to buy them in pharmacies. The drugs are costly and spend about US$50 every month on drugs including insulin jabs that I take every day,” said Chinouya.
Chinouya said the condition was taking its toll on her as she has since stopped going to work and is now confined to her home as she often fails to get money to buy the drugs on time.
She says she has some secondary diseases caused by the chronic condition that has forced her to stay home and is now selling chickens for a livelihood.
“I stopped going to work because of diabetes as I was almost in hospital and since then I have struggled to make ends meet and now I have a small chicken project at home where I am earning a livelihood.
I was used to go to work and provide for my family but since the diagnosis, my health deteriorated such that I find it difficult to have a full-time job,” said Chinouya.
Although she was receiving medication to keep the disease under control, she said she had constant fears of her condition deteriorating and said her wish was that medications and sundry be made available at public hospitals so that people easily get treatment and more people get early diagnosis and seek treatment.
Statistics by the International Diabetes Federation show that one in 10 adults worldwide have diabetes and over 90 percent have type 2 diabetes.
Diabetes is a chronic health condition that results in too much sugar in the blood which, with time might lead to serious damage to the heart, blood vessels, eyes, nerves, and kidneys. With diabetes, the body cannot make enough insulin or it fails to use the insulin as it should.
