The health workforce crisis
Rift Valley
By
Anthony Gitonga
| May 06, 2026
The Kenya Environmental Health and Public Health Practitioners Union (KEHPHPU) has warned that the country’s public health sector could collapse due to an acute shortage of staff.
According to the union, the government's financial resources have been skewed towards curative services at the expense of public health, leaving critical gaps at the community level.
Speaking at the first National Public Health Leadership Summit in Naivasha, Brown Ashira, the union Secretary-General, blamed the Ministry of Health for the crisis, noting that no recruitment of public health officers had been carried out in over 15 years.
Ashira warned that the Ministry has also failed to replace ageing and retiring public health officers, a situation he said risked paralysing disease surveillance at the community level.
"The union calls for the recruitment of more public health officers and technicians, since the last time they were employed was before devolution came into place," said Ashira.
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He also raised the alarm over the deployment of non-public health officers who had been mandated to oversee key programmes, including school health and tuberculosis control, roles he argued should be reserved for qualified practitioners.
On his part, Mohamed Duba, Secretary General of the Association of Public Health Officers, Kenya, opposed the proposed amendments to the Tobacco Control Act, citing the removal of technical personnel from its oversight structure.
"Public health officers are the enforcers of the Tobacco Control Act, and we urge the Parliamentary Health Committee to reject the proposed bill if the technical persons are not included in the board of directors", said Duba.
Kakamega County Director of Public Health William Olaka echoed the concerns, calling for the employment of more qualified public health officers.
He called on the authorities to address the growing problem of unregistered practitioners operating without licenses and putting lives at risk.
Olaka also took issue with the lack of consultation of public health officers in the implementation of school health programmes, warning that this risked undermining public health outcomes.
On his part, Peter Mwaziwe, from the Public Health Officers and Technicians Council, called for the registration and licensing of all those practicing as public health officers.
“We are putting notice to all those health officers without licenses that they will be barred from practicing in their respective counties,” he said.
"We call upon the Parliamentary Health Committee to reject the bill if the key technical personnel are not included," he added.
Dr Stephen Muleshe, Director of Public Health at the Ministry of Health, acknowledged the vital role played by public health and environmental officers in the detection, prevention, protection, and promotion of public health at the community level.
Muleshe said the Ministry was implementing robust health sector reforms and that public health officers would be involved in developing policies to safeguard the sector going forward.