By VICTOR KIPROP

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Kenya has completed preparations to host 100 Cuban specialists on a two-year deal that will cost the country more than $20 million even as even as Uganda enters advanced stages in its plan to bring in 200 Cuban specialists.

Experts in both countries terms the plans an expensive, unnecessary undertaking.

This week, Nairobi said it was ready to receive the specialists on May 28, a month earlier than the initial indicated arrival date, after signing the final agreement with the 47 county governments which are expected to each receive at least two of the Cubans.

The memorandum of understanding between the National government and the Council of Governors will see the counties provide the doctors with accommodation, security and local transport while the national government caters for their salaries and air fare to and from Cuba when serving their 30-day annual leave.

“The doctors will operate a two-pronged approach, of both service delivery and capacity building of our local doctors through mentorship and working alongside the physicians in our health sector,” said Health Cabinet Secretary Sicily Kariuki.

The ministry also defended the cost of the deal arguing that the Cubans who will work 40-hour weeks, will be in Job group S — earning between $7,861 and $8,821 — like their Kenyan counterparts.

However, the Kenya Medical Practitioners Pharmacists & Dentists Union (KMPDU) maintains that the wages paid to the Cuban doctors are discriminatory, arguing that Kenyan specialist doctors who put in between 55 and 96 hours a week are placed in job group M, N and P, earning between $3,697 and $6,012.

KMPDU secretary general Dr Ouma Oluga, also says the hiring of the 53 family physicians and 47 Cuban specialists was discriminative against the over 2,000 Kenyan doctors and 171 specialists who are waiting to be employed.

Meanwhile, in Uganda the government’s plan for 200 specialist doctors is entering homestretch as Ministry of Health awaits for Cabinet approval for the first batch of 40.

The ministry did not disclose when the first lot, which it plans to deploy in public hospitals in the rural areas to meet the need for specialist medics, but maintains that the country is in “urgent” need of their services.

Like Kenya, Uganda will deploy the Cubans to public hospitals in the rural areas, even as the two countries work towards achieving the UN’s 1:1,000 doctor to patient ratio.

Kenya has a total 10,921 registered doctors, 7,000 in practice while about 1,000 others, including less than 100 specialists, are trained every year.