Desperate Zimbabweans cross Zambia border for cheaper healthcare, medicines
Al Jazeera
With essential drugs and specialised care expensive or unavailable, poor Zimbabweans opt to travel long distances.
Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe – At 5pm at the Victoria Falls border post, Margaret Tshuma – who has a 24-hour day pass to be in Zambia – is in a rush to return home to Zimbabwe before dusk.
This is not the first time Tshuma, 53, has travelled from her rural home in Diki village, 120km (75 miles) away, to cross into Zambia for the day. It has become a routine trip she makes monthly to buy medication for her husband who has scleritis – an inflammatory condition that affects the outer covering of the eye.
The prescribed medication is barely available on the shelves of pharmacies in Hwange district, where she lives. Of what is there, the high cost makes it inaccessible to many, she said.
“The same medication is expensive back home. If you add transport and medication costs altogether, it is still cheaper to come to Zambia. Also most times, some of this medication is not readily available which risks the patients’ lives,” said Tshuma.
Buying the medicines in Zimbabwe costs Tshuma about $85 a month, whereas just across the border in Livingstone she pays 320 kwacha ($13). Even with travel, it works in her favour, as a two-way trip from Hwange to Livingstone costs $14.
