Men jam pandemic hotline with calls

Dr Pauline Karingu at the call centre. Some 50 doctors are on standby to respond to coronavirus concerns. [Elvis Ogina, Standard]

More men than women are calling the 719 hotline set up by the Ministry of Health for coronavirus information.

According to call centre data, three quarters of the callers have been men, most of them from the Rift Valley and Western regions.

The toll free line, accessible from all mobile phone networks, was set up in March through the National Aids and STIs Control Programme (Nascop). 

Nascop was chosen because it already had an existing elaborate call centre dubbed Uliza Nascop that handled queries, counselling among other services for people living with HIV and Aids in the country.

With this, the officers at Nascop already had experience in handling health related queries at a call centre. The officers were then supported by 50 more doctors to scale up the call centre to handle the coronavirus pandemic.

“Some of the cases we handle are very complex and need someone with a medical background to determine whether they meet the case definition, while some are healthcare workers who need help in managing the clients that they have,” said Dr Lazarus Momanyi, a team leader at the call centre.

Referring calls

Callers are either referred to an emergency response centre, rapid response teams in the counties, the Kenya Police Service or the Kenya Red Cross for further assistance.

All calls and cases are logged in as they come for record purposes to avoid any misinformation along the chain of communication.

The 50 doctors who were hired specifically for the call centre were trained for two days to equip them with all the necessary information on coronavirus and call handling skills.

William Adegu, one of the doctors at the call centre, said he found his new assignment both involving and fulfilling.

“It is more involving because you cannot see the client at the other end of the line; you have to use a lot of your clinical skills to pick up signs and symptoms from the client, even when they are not telling you because they think it is not important,” said Dr Adegu.

Most Kenyans who initially called the 719 hotline were anxious about the pandemic, unsure of the symptoms they had and whether these were related to coronavirus.

Others called for information on how to avoid contracting the disease.

“Some called to ask if we are prepared to handle the pandemic if it gets out of control,” said Adegu.

Esther Wambui, fresh from medical internship three months ago, took up the opportunity to be on call for Kenyans seeking advice on the coronavirus as a different way of applying her medical knowledge for benefit of the public.

“Some calls are pranks though, or about an illness somebody had a decade back, while others call to say they have a cure for the virus,” said Dr Wambui.

Still, the doctors at the call centre say the service should be expanded to counties to handle all medical queries before any further action.

At the beginning, 300 agents from Safaricom were trained in partnership with the Ministry of Health to handle basic queries on coronavirus from callers.

According to Safaricom's Chief Customer Officer Sylvia Mulinge, the number of callers has reduced compared to the calls and texts that the network received previously. She attributes this to more Kenyans having access to information on coronavirus.

“The quality of interactions has also changed; today they are more about cases rather than just seeking for general information,” she says.

Still, the medics have to deal with all manner of calls. At some point, Adegu received a call from a mother of three saying she needed food for her children. She was promptly referred to the Kenya Red Cross, who have a nutrition programme.

The medics work in three shifts: two during the day and one from 8pm to 8am.