BAMBAO - The Bambao hospital, nestled in a tropical forest on Anjouan island in the Comoros, was meant to bring state-of-the-art medical care to the poor Indian Ocean nation.
The hospital is some 30 kilometres east of Mutsamudu, the capital of Anjouan, the poorest of the three islands comprising the Union of the Comoros. But a project that cost four billion Comoran francs today looks more like a ghost ship, with a handful of patients wandering its corridors in stifling heat. For lack of funds, about 100 staff jobs have not been filled.In the emergency ward, a doctor silently examines a child's injured arm. The lethargic mood is broken only by the arrival of an ambulance carrying the victim of a motorcycle accident.
"At the start, the road from Mutsamudu was in a very bad state and patients had trouble getting here," the administrator said. "It's been repaired since, but our real problem is that we sorely lack equipment and staff." Much of the funding comes from the French Development Agency in its aid budget. France still rules over the fourth major island in the archipelago, Mayotte.
Those who believed that providing a modern hospital on Anjouan would dissuade Comorans from trying their luck on Mayotte have been disappointed, although the trip is illegal.