The Ministry of Health and Child Care has told Zimbabweans not to panic about a rise in influenza cases, saying the increase matches the pattern the country sees every winter.

In a statement issued this week, the ministry said it was tracking the situation through the national disease surveillance system and reports from health facilities. “Zimbabwe is experiencing its annual seasonal increase in influenza cases, typically seen during the winter months of June and July,” it said, adding: “There is currently no cause for alarm, as the increase is consistent with normal seasonal patterns.”

The reassurance follows weeks of public unease, much of it on social media, about a flu-like illness that people have described as unusually severe. CITE reported that concern has been strongest in Bulawayo, with some describing symptoms as brutal and comparing them to Covid-19. Doctors have rejected any link to a new coronavirus strain.

The ministry named several groups as being at higher risk of complications: young children, older people, pregnant women, and people living with diabetes, heart disease, asthma or HIV, as well as anyone with weakened immunity. Those groups, it said, should seek medical attention early if flu symptoms appear.

Most people recover within a few days, according to the ministry, and should rest, drink plenty of fluids, eat properly and use paracetamol for fever or body aches. It warned specifically against reaching for antibiotics. “Antibiotics do not treat influenza, as it is caused by a virus,” the ministry said, adding that they should only be used when prescribed.

Warning signs that warrant medical attention include difficulty breathing, persistent high fever, chest pain, severe weakness or confusion, convulsions, signs of dehydration, or symptoms that improve and then worsen again. Parents and caregivers were told to act quickly if a young child is struggling to breathe, refusing to feed or unusually drowsy.

On prevention, the ministry advised regular handwashing with soap or sanitiser, covering the mouth and nose when coughing or sneezing, keeping homes and workplaces ventilated, and avoiding close contact with people who are unwell. Anyone with symptoms was urged to stay at home where possible, and to wear a mask if they must go out or visit a clinic.

The ministry said it would continue monitoring the situation and publish further updates where necessary.

Sources: Ministry of Health and Child Care statement, NewsDay, CITE.

Zimbabweans who have come home from South Africa since anti-immigrant protests escalated at the end of June are struggling to restart HIV treatment they were forced to abandon, according to reporting by Health Policy Watch and field updates from Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF).

MSF, which has been running clinics at the South African government’s temporary repatriation centre near Musina and at the Beitbridge reception centre on the Zimbabwean side, said in a project update at the end of July that it was treating people whose access to HIV, tuberculosis and other chronic medication had been cut off. Caroline Masunda, the organisation’s emergency medical team lead in Musina, said teams were seeing patients who had been turned away from South African health facilities for months, raising the risk of treatment failure and drug resistance.

“More than 100,000 people fleeing or being displaced are the kind of numbers MSF see in hot conflict areas, not relatively stable democracies like South Africa,” Masunda said, calling on governments in the region to co-ordinate on continuity of care. MSF noted that South African authorities had reported processing more than 53,000 migrants for repatriation, while larger return figures circulating in the region came from media reports rather than its own count.

Health Policy Watch, in reporting republished this week by NewZimbabwe.com, documented cases of returnees who defaulted on antiretrovirals after anti-immigrant groups blockaded clinics in South Africa, and who then waited longer than expected to be registered for treatment once home.

Health and Child Care Minister Douglas Mombeshora told the National Assembly in July that health workers had been deployed at ports of entry and that more than 99,000 returnees had been screened for chronic conditions including HIV, diabetes and hypertension. He said emergency clinics at the border were dispensing a maximum five-day supply of antiretrovirals — enough to get people to their home districts — because Zimbabwe uses different treatment regimens from South Africa and needs baseline tests, including viral load, before starting long-term care.

Asked whether the government had any system for matching South African and Zimbabwean protocols, Mombeshora replied: “The short answer is no, we do not have those models.”

Sources: Médecins Sans Frontières project update, 30 July 2026; Health Policy Watch, republished by NewZimbabwe.com; NewsDay; Africanews.

Certificate of Sponsorship Scandal Sees Zimbabwe Care Workers Pay up to  £8k for Visa

Care workers recruited from Zimbabwe are being trapped in the UK. They are forced to pay large debts to recruitment agencies before they can start working. Once they start working, they are paid very little and are often forced to work long hours without breaks. This has led to a situation where these care workers are being exploited and treated unfairly. It has been discovered that Zimbabwean care workers who come to the UK to start their careers are getting scammed and exploited by middlemen. These workers are being taken advantage of by unscrupulous middlemen who trick them into coming to the UK and then withholding up to 50% of their wages, forcing them to live in squalor.

Due to the economic crisis in Zimbabwe, many trained care professionals are seeking employment overseas. However, many agencies, which are often run by Zimbabweans in the UK and are unregulated, are exploiting these workers. Zimbabwean nurses have been working in Britain for years, but hiring care workers is a new trend. Experts say that an ecosystem of manipulation has been built around this phenomenon, which is highly exploitative. One way to move to the UK is to complete a Red Cross care worker certification program, which is highly sought after. However, locals say that middlemen exploit the certificate of sponsorship (COS) by charging high fees.

Terrence Macheka, a trainee nurse, plans to emigrate to the UK when he graduates, and he says that his wife was scammed by agents who charged $380 to put her on the training waiting list, despite the official Red Cross certification fee being only $300. Closed WhatsApp groups show that these agents then ask care workers to pay up to £5,000 to be linked with UK-based care agencies. This has created a web of corruption, where UK-based care agencies run by Zimbabwe nationals give the COS to their relatives and friends first, while others have to pay hefty fees that reach £4,000. Some charge as high as £7,000, which is against British law. 

The UK law is clear that a recruitment agency cannot charge a fee for ‘placing’ an employee, and the person who ‘assigns’ or prepares and allocates the COS cannot be related to the prospective employee. However, regulation of these agencies is weak, and the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) suggests that their hands are tied because these actors are not under UK jurisdiction. DHSC says that some organisations may use repayment clauses to recoup upfront costs if internationally recruited staff do not meet the terms of their contract, which is acceptable. Still, it would be concerning if the repayment costs were disproportionate or punitive.

According to experts, various schemes are taking advantage of the chronic staffing issues faced by the UK’s social and healthcare systems. The NHS alone has to fill 40,000 nursing positions, which has led to a surge in international recruitment. The Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) recently signed a deal with Nepal, allowing 100 nurses to work at the Hampshire Hospital NHS Foundation Trust. This pilot scheme could potentially open up opportunities for thousands of Nepalese nurses to work in the UK. However, the ethics of this move have been questioned by Sir Andrew Goddard, president of the Royal College of Physicians. Nepal is on an international recruitment red list, which the World Health Organization (WHO) operates to prevent developed countries from actively recruiting from regions with a lack of health workers or an undeveloped health system. Sir Andrew said, “That the UK should have [to] do special deals with other countries to support its own NHS workforce is in itself a marker of how workforce planning for the NHS has failed. That we are taking from a country that has substantially lower numbers of healthcare workers than many countries have is something we should have serious reservations about.”

NHS England has also been accused of “emptying” Zimbabwe of health workers. Although the country is not on the red list, experts have warned of a “critical shortage” of staff. In 2020, the UK issued 1,059 skilled visas to Zimbabweans, a figure which jumped to 5,549 in 2022, placing the southern African country among the UK’s top five skilled visa grantees. However, the recruitment drive has drained Zimbabwe so badly that Bulawayo municipality, in the southwest, recently complained that 13 nurses out of its skeleton staff have moved to the UK since January.

Despite the vast difference in the number of health professionals per population, Zimbabwe has managed to maintain a decent nurse-to-patient ratio, with 1.9 nurses and midwives per 1,000 people in 2018. In comparison, the UK had 8.2 nurses and midwives per 1,000 people. However, Zimbabwe is currently facing extreme poverty, which has led to nurses seeking better opportunities elsewhere. Despite being paid just $79 a month and dealing with a high patient load, Zimbabwean nurses have been fleeing the country due to the high inflation rate, which has shot up to 479% in 2020, according to Steve Hanke, director of the Troubled Currencies project at the Cato Institute. These nurses hope for a better life when they reach the UK, but many find themselves in a similar situation of financial insecurity. Experts warn that the issue of overcharging by agencies has become too large to ignore, with leaked care-worker pay slips showing salaries of £2,255 being drained by their employers under the guise of administrative fees until only £604 is left, causing an uproar on Twitter in June.

Mr Chagonda left the UK after only a few months due to unbearable conditions. He was not the only one who experienced a significant reduction in wages or had to live in cramped accommodations. During his time in Britain, he had to pay £70 a week to share a house with eight other people.

“I’ll never return to the UK as a care worker,” he told the local newspaper, describing such schemes as a form of modern slavery. However, the situation for those who were undocumented was even more dire. “I met people who had been in the UK since 1999, without papers, who worked as care workers for agencies and were left with only £300. You just do what they ask you to do,” he said, referring to his colleagues in Leeds. He added that some workers were so financially strapped that they had to sleep in their clients’ homes.