Burundi Hospitals

So, I was going to tell you a bit about the hospitals here.
We’ve had a tour of 2 private hospitals, which is what I’ll start with. I won’t go into much detail.
A large room houses between 10 and 12 people; rooms can house men and women together; beds are literally back to back, no curtains to separate them. Linens may or may not be provided. It’s very dirty and smelly. AIDS patients are beside malaria patients who are beside anal hernia patients who are beside…. All food and drink has to be brought in by family/friends. If this does not happen because of lack of family or funds, the patient literally does not eat. Family/friends are also the caregivers. Nurses and doctors primarily administer drugs etc.; equipment is almost non-existent. Beds are probably at least 50 years old. People, I think mainly care givers, lying on the ground outside. Laundry spread out on the ground to dry.
Camping tents are the overflow - I’m very serious. When we had a tour there was a surgery in progress, and the door was not completely shut. This was a normal `house door`, no double or triple doors leading to the O.R, just a regular door off the hallway. The person that was giving us the tour opened the door further, and there, splayed on the table was a patient undergoing surgery, open to gross contamination.
There was a high pile of broken beds stacked up against the one wall outside, not far from the `tent ward.`
The government hospitals are much, much worse. The one where Divine stayed and died in was almost unbearably filthy. No linens are provided. The walls are so splattered with ``stuff`` that has run down that it seriously almost looks like a wallpaper pattern. Every Band-Aid, every needle, every dressing, absolutely every single thing that the patient needs for the treatment of the ailment they are suffering from has to be bought by the family/ friends. Again, caregivers of the sick tend to almost all needs. There’s a big metal barrel cut in half just outside a cluster of rooms that serves as the needle/blood transfusion/empty IV/food scrapes disposal. It reeks.
Emergency service - The day Mama Queen was  brought in and died she had to wait about 5 hours before she was seen by a doctor; this is completely normal. There is much that I could say, but won’t.
One thing I ask of you, the reader. Please don’t whine and complain and get angry about our western medical system when things don’t go as you wish they would. And please don’t whine and complain and gripe about the high taxes that you pay, because a large part of the taxes you pay goes toward your medical coverage. You have no idea how blessed you are. Thank God for what you have.