Botswana\u00a0declared a public health emergency on Aug 25 (2025) after hospitals ran out of essential medicines due to depleted government coffers and steep cuts in US aid.<\/p>\n
President Duma Boko said in a televised address on Aug 25 (2025) that the country\u2019s medical supply chain had failed and announced 250 million pula (RM78.4mil) in emergency funding to restock clinics and hospitals.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe current prices [for medicine] often are inflated five to ten times.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd under the current economic conditions, this scenario is not sustainable.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe are taking bold steps to ensure that never again will Botswana suffer due to broken systems,\u201d he said, adding that the military would oversee drug distribution.<\/p>\n
Earlier in August (2025), Botswana\u2019s health ministry warned that the system was \u201cseverely strained\u201d with one billion pula (RM313mil) owed to private health facilities and suppliers.<\/p>\n
It cited shortages of medicines for high blood pressure, cancer, diabetes, tuberculosis, asthma, mental and sexual health, and stated that elective surgeries were postponed.<\/p>\n
Botswana\u2019s vast diamond reserves, discovered just after independence from Britain in 1966, make up about 80% of the country\u2019s foreign earnings.<\/p>\n
But sales have weakened in recent years, pushing a cash-strapped government to suspend certain ministerial purchases last month.<\/p>\n
Sweeping cuts in American aid under US President Donald Trump have further strained the economy.<\/p>\n
Before the cuts, the United States funded a third of Botswana\u2019s HIV (human immunodeficiency virus) response, according to UNAIDS, and provided US$12mil (RM51mil) through the Global Fund to fight malaria and tuberculosis. \u2013 AFP<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Botswana\u00a0declared a public health emergency on Aug 25 (2025) after hospitals ran out of essential medicines due to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":111874,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[64,63,21899,1730,137,490,537],"class_list":{"0":"post-111873","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-medication","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-botswana","11":"tag-drugs","12":"tag-health","13":"tag-medication","14":"tag-wellness"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/111873","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=111873"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/111873\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/111874"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=111873"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=111873"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=111873"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}