August 7, 2026
By Elvis Kintu Nsonyi
New York City
Two weeks ago, we lost Stella Nangonzi in a motor accident at Katonga, Masaka road. Stella was a wife to my brother Francis Ssenyonjo. As I sat in quiet reflection on how they were rushed to a private Nkozi Hospital Accident, Injury and Trauma Centre, two moments of human existence echoed vividly in my mind, the piercing cries of a newborn child and the sorrowful wails at a burial.
These twin cries of birth and death stand as powerful markers of the fragility and sanctity of life. Between these two moments lies a journey governed by one thing above all; health. And yet, in Uganda, that journey remains dangerously uncertain.
The tragedy of Stella’s death is not an isolated misfortune. It is a painful reminder of a deeper national failure: Uganda’s health system is collapsing under chronic underfunding and a relentless brain drain of its best medical professionals. Doctors trained at public expense are leaving in droves for better pay and working conditions abroad, while the facilities they leave behind remain broken, understaffed and dependent on donor goodwill. Ordinary Ugandans, and even the powerful — are left to navigate a system that too often cannot keep them alive from the first cry of birth to the last breath.
Despite our alignment with global health protocols and the adoption of commendable policies, Uganda’s health system continues to struggle with systemic underinvestment.
During my time at Kampala Capital City Authority (KCCA), I was deeply alarmed to learn that most of the City’s essential health interventions were bankrolled by donor agencies rather than national funding. What ought to be a self sustaining and State supported health infrastructure is instead heavily dependent on external goodwill. This dependence is not just concerning, it is unsustainable!
Kampala Lord Mayor Erias Lukwago repeatedly asked why the government consistently failed to honor the Abuja Declaration. Uganda and 44 other states pledged to allocate at least 15% of the national budget to health. Yet, over two decades later, Uganda allocates barely 6.4% according to the Ministry of Finance and WHO data. The consequences are clear, a chronically underfunded and underperforming health system incapable of meeting the needs of the citizenry.
Across the country, public hospitals are in crisis. Most regional referral hospitals operate with broken down equipment, dilapidated buildings and limited medical supplies while the National Drug Authority regularly incinerates expired drugs. Even well intended renovation projects are often either delayed or sabotaged by corruption and resource diversion.
Take the Lubowa International Hospital for example, a project that was once hailed as Uganda’s future medical hub. Years later, it remains an idle construction site, mired in scandal and delay.
Uganda is hemorrhaging health professionals. The Uganda Medical Association has consistently raised alarm about the high percentage of doctors trained in Uganda who now practice abroad. I talked to Dr. Mitala Luwukya who confessed that they are lured by better pay, facilities and working conditions. Ironically, these same doctors are accessed by Ugandan public officials not at Mulago, but via costly medical tourism to Europe, India and South Africa.
At home, public hospitals grapple with severe staffing shortages. Health workers contend with poor remuneration, unsafe working conditions and little career progression. Instead of investing in their welfare, Uganda is exporting its best and brightest to strengthen other nations’ systems.
Rural expectant mothers continue to deliver under the care of traditional birth attendants, not by choice, but necessity. In contrast, their urban counterparts often schedule caesarean sections at private hospitals. Two vastly different realities within the same nation but ironically, in some cases, the rural mothers receive more compassionate care.
Meanwhile, elderly Ugandans battling non communicable diseases (NCDs) like hypertension and diabetes often face a slow and painful decline. These are not sudden emergencies, they are predictable conditions. Yet, we have failed to plan for them.
Without a functional national health insurance scheme, Ugandans are forced to pay out of pocket for care. For many, this leads to financial ruin. In recent years, the country has witnessed horrifying cases of hospitals detaining patients and even holding dead bodies over unpaid bills!
Countries such as our neighbours Rwanda have made strides with universal health coverage, registering improved life expectancy and reduced mortality. Uganda tabled a National Health Insurance Bill but it remains stalled due to inertia and vested interests.
Under Gen. Yoweri Museveni’s leadership, health has been treated as a privilege, not a right. Former Foreign Affairs Minister Sam Kuteesa constructed a church to thank God for curing his throat cancer in a German hospital. This was an implicit acknowledgement that faith and foreign systems now deliver what ours cannot.
A healthy population is not just a moral imperative, it is a national asset. A productive workforce, higher tax revenue and economic resilience all stem from good health. Uganda must realign its national priorities. We need a lifespan health policy that is inclusive, adequately funded and strategically planned.
Justice Irene Mulyagonja’s remarks at the requiem mass for her husband John Baptist Kakooza were both poignant and powerful as she highlighted a painful reality in Uganda’s healthcare system. Her candid account of failing to find basic medical supplies like insulin and gloves at Mulago National Referral Hospital underscores a critical dysfunction in a system that many ordinary Ugandans rely on daily. And now a learned Magistrate sends Erias Lukwago to Mulago, laughable!
I thought the fact that a person of Mulyagonja’s stature, a high ranking public servant and former Inspector General of Government could not access essential medical supplies in the country’s top referral hospital sent a stark message to the Judiciary. If she, with her access and influence, faced such hurdles, it raises troubling questions about what everyday Ugandans go through when seeking care.
I don’t know how Magistrate Sarah Basemera, Justices David Matovu and Baguma Emmanuel feel about this in the matter of Erias Lukwago and Dr. Kizza Besigye especially after the demise of Hon. Muhammad Ssegirinya and Bernhard Glaser a German national who died a day after the Kampala High Court granted him a cash bail of 30 million Shillings to travel abroad for medical treatment.
Accountability now rests with all three arms of government. The Executive must fund health as a constitutional right, reverse the brain drain, and stop exporting Uganda’s doctors while its hospitals collapse. Parliament must urgently pass and fully resource a national health insurance scheme instead of allowing it to stall indefinitely. The Judiciary, which has seen the human cost of this failure up close, must insist that the right to life and dignity is not empty rhetoric. Only when the Executive, Legislature and Judiciary act with urgency and integrity can Uganda stop haemorrhaging its healers and protect every citizen from the first cry of birth to the last breath of death.
To be continued.
