Haufiku wants Cabinet to raise booze prices

The Minister of Health and Social Services, Dr Bernhard Haufiku, is preparing a Cabinet submission to call for higher taxes on alcoholic drinks, resulting in price hikes. Haufiku announced his intention at a staff meeting at the Katutura State Hospital yesterday. Four months ago, Namibia was ranked as the third highest alcohol consumer on the African continent. “When you go to Pick and Pay on Sundays you see the alcohol section is cordoned off and people cannot buy [wine and beer], but if you go to Katutura you can find Jack Daniels, Johnny Walker... every hard drink can be bought on a Sunday,” he said. Haufiku said he had received complaints about staff going to work drunk. Chief Social Worker Geraldine Kalinga told the minister that staff are driven to drink by their poor living conditions. She said the stressful nature of their work and their poor salaries are adding to the stress of health workers. “We need healthy health professionals; these people are stressed because of their financial situations. We have some staff members who come from kambashus (shacks),” she said. Kalinga also called for the establishment of a psychology department to take care of the ministry’s psycho-social needs. Addressing the acute shortage of decent accommodation for nurses, Haufiku said the government can forget about attracting staff if the poor state of affairs persists. He called for the installation of televisions in the nurses’ tearooms, saying it is vital that nursing staff are comfortable in their working environment. Haufiku said in Egypt, only the rich and responsible drinkers can afford alcohol - the opposite of the situation in Namibia. World Health Organisation statistics show that Namibians have risky drinking patterns. Other countries on this list include Belarus, Belize, Grenada, Guatemala, Kazakhstan, Mexico, South Africa, the Russian Federation, Ukraine and Zimbabwe. According to statistics, more than half of the Namibian population don’t drink, but the majority of drinkers engage in heavy binge drinking. On average every Namibian aged 15 and older drinks 10.8 litres of pure alcohol per year. Alcohol abuse has been named as one of the major contributors to the high HIV infection rate in the country, as well as the carnage on national roads. Excessive alcohol abuse has also been cited as the number one cause of gender-based violence and the high rate of passion killings in Namibia. WINDHOEK JEMIMA BEUKES