05/08/2025
📢 OPEN LETTER
To: Honourable Professor Mthuli Ncube
Minister of Finance, Economic Development and Investment Promotion
Republic of Zimbabwe
đź“… Date: 4 August 2025
“Honourable Minister, We Are Dying in Silence”
An Urgent Appeal to Prioritise Health in the 2026 National Budget
—from people living with HIV, NCDs, and mental health challenges
Dear Honourable Minister,
We write to you not just as advocates or beneficiaries of a broken system,
but as fellow Zimbabweans—parents, daughters, sons, workers, and survivors—
living with pain, carrying invisible burdens, and holding onto hope.
We are the ones behind the statistics.
The cancer survivor who sleeps on a concrete bench because the radiotherapy machine is always down.
The mother on antiretroviral treatment with no food to take her tablets.
The grandmother walking 10km to a clinic without paracetamol.
The young person silenced by depression, with no one to listen, nowhere to go.
We are not just patients.
We are the backbone of families. The future of our country.
And we are suffering—not only from disease, but from neglect.
đź’” A Health Budget That Falls Short of Life
In your 2025 Mid-Year Budget Review, health received only 10.1% of the national budget.
But Zimbabwe made a promise—to its people and to Africa—through the Abuja Declaration:
to allocate at least 15% to health.
That missing 5% is not just a number.
It is the difference between care and crisis.
Between healing and heartbreak.
Between life and premature death.
We face a heavy and rising burden of non-communicable diseases (NCDs), HIV, mental health conditions, and disabilities—yet essential services remain out of reach:
Clinics without medicines, nurses, or even working BP machines.
Children with epilepsy with no treatment.
Health workers overwhelmed and under-resourced.
Loved ones dying from preventable, treatable diseases.
🙏🏽 Honourable Minister, we cannot carry this alone.
We are not asking for luxury.
We are pleading for dignity
