‘People are dying on the floor’: healthcare workers tell of Covid devastation in Solomon Islands

Frontline health workers in Solomon Islands have warned that its health system is on the brink of collapse as the country struggles to deal with a devastating outbreak of Covid-19.

A senior doctor and two nurses at the National Referral Hospital (NRH) in the capital of Honiara have told of how there are no beds for Covid patients - leading to people dying on the floor of the wards - as well as a lack of facilities and staff shortages that have led to Covid-positive nurses being recalled to work and probationary nurses tending to critically ill patients solo, when they should be supervised by a more senior nurse.

Solomon Islands, a country of about 700,000 people in the South Pacific, had remained Covid-free throughout the pandemic, without a single case of the virus in 2020 and 2021. However, since Covid arrived in the country in mid-January, the country has recorded nearly 6,000 cases and around 70 deaths.

The doctor, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the true number of deaths was likely to be much higher.

"We have witnessed that there are deaths at home, not brought to hospital because of the fear that any dead body that comes to the hospital will be swabbed and once tested positive will not be allowed to be taken out by the relatives," he said. "So some deaths are kept at home and it's a sad and terrible thing to happen."

The doctor warned that healthcare facilities were struggling to cope, with the 56-bed Central field hospital fully occupied. He said that while tents had been prepared outside the hospital for the treatment of Covid-19 patients, they had no toilets, shower rooms or air-conditioning, which he alleged showed the government's lack of preparation.

"I would say that the government has failed this nation."