Interview: Mozambique salutes "remarkable", life-saving Chinese doctors

Mozambique's health authority has hailed the African country's medical cooperation with China as "one of the best."

For the past 40 years after Mozambique's independence from Portugal in 1975, China has dispatched over 300 medical workers to assist the southern African country's health service as part of the two countries' medical cooperation.

Speaking to Xinhua in a recent interview in Maputo, Mozambique's Deputy Minister of Health Mouzinho Saide said Chinese doctors' reputation in Mozambique is "remarkable" when it comes to saving lives.

Chinese doctors are highly respected with their expertise, responsibility as well as their readiness to respond to the needs of patients, Saide said.

"We found the medical teams display discipline and knowledge, they establish good examples of activities in medical operations by saving lives in hospitals," said Saide.

The two countries started to cooperate in the health sector in 1975, and China was among the first to cooperate with Mozambique in this regard.

China's cooperation played an important role in a period when Mozambique had almost no properly trained doctors after the Portuguese settlers left the country, Saide added.

Currently, the 20th medical team of China to Mozambique has 13 doctors, who on average carry out over 1,100 outpatients and over 120 surgeries on a monthly basis.

"Our doctors are mainly from the clinical medicines, ranging from surgery, orthopedics, to obstetrics and gynecology," said Liu Cunwei, head the medical team.

Mozambique is facing a severe, generalized HIV/AIDS epidemic, which is currently affecting 11.5 percent of the Mozambican population aged between 15-49 years old. Meanwhile, malaria and tuberculosis are also among the primary under-lying causes of illness and fatality in the country.

Nevertheless, some occupational exposures are difficult to avoid, given that staff proficiency in the majority of the local hospitals is yet to enhance.

Liu recalled that one of the Chinese doctors was once accidentally pierced by a needle handed over by his assistant during a surgery for an AIDS carrier.

For security reasons the doctor had to adopt post-exposure prophylaxis treatment, an antiretroviral drug treatment as prevention option with strong side effects, for at least one month to reduce the possibility of infection.

"Chinese doctors are probably the only ones treating local patients for free in the country, taking no salary from the Mozambican government," said Liu.

As to malaria, China has provided help in facilities and medicines to Mozambique. "From this cooperation, Mozambique has benefited from malaria drugs, and we also got from the Macau forum (Forum for Economic and Trade Cooperation between China and Portuguese Language Countries) different equipment for the functioning of the hospitals as well as training of medical doctors to treat malaria and other tropical diseases," said Saide.

Saide, who has been to China in 2005, said that "one of the areas we learn a lot from China is in the traditional Chinese medicine."

Saide expressed belief that traditional Chinese medicine has a very big potential in Mozambique.

"We need to make this potential to benefit more people, and it could serve as a complementary to address the drug deficit in Mozambique," added Saide. Enditem