Officials and eye patients at Ruhengeri Hospital welcomed the upgraded eye clinic. The centre expected to increase access to eye treatment was completed at a cost of $400,000 (about Rwf290 million).

Its construction, installation of equipment and other requirements were sponsored by Onesight which is a non-profit organisation.

Dr Deo Ndekezi, the director of Ruhengeri Hospital, said the facility would help the hospital treat various eye diseases unlike before when they were compelled to refer many patients to other hospitals.

Mony Iyer, Onesight’s senior director for strategy and innovation, said the new facility would act as pilot project before spread it to the rest of the country.

In the same week, police in Kigali paraded a group of eight people accused of using witchcraft and brutally torturing a 17-year-old mentally ill boy.

The prime suspect, Julienne Mukashema, claimed to be a traditional healer and argued that she met the victim on the streets and took him to her home in Kacyiru, Gasabo District (where she apparently had a shrine) after learning that he had mental illness.

When Police arrived at Mukashema’s home in Kabizi Cell on Tuesday night, they found the victim chained outside.

The victim had his hands tied behind his back with a metallic chain locked with a padlock and his waist strapped on a slab to keep him on the ground. Strange noises coming from Mukashema’s home raised concerns within the neighbourhood.

Meanwhile in a move to improve Kigali city hygiene, officials last week discussed adjustments for measures to address the problem of hygiene within the city.

A lot of money has been invested in the project to meet the growing number of vendors. As a result, people resort to dumping leftovers on the streets instead of dumping them into rubbish bins placed at strategic locations around the city.

Else where at King Faisal Hospital, this week 27 neurosurgery patients will be operated after many of them endured a long wait for specialised medical care.

The move, spearheaded by neurosurgeons, was preceeded by screenings of the pending cases both at the University Teaching Hospital of Kigali (CHUK) and King Faisal Hospital – Kigali.

For three days last week, the neurosurgeons conducted a medical camp at CHUK during which they screened patients with relevant pending appointments from all over the country. They later moved the exercise to King Faisal Hospital where they screened patients for two more days ahead of the surgical operations, scheduled between July 27 and 31. The exercise is part of the activities to mark five years of the Rwanda Neurosurgery Centre.

In developments around the world, the first malaria vaccine has been recommended for use in Africa, bringing scientists a step closer to preventing hundreds of thousands of deaths each year.

It is hoped that the Mosquiriz jab will help prevent some of the half a million malaria deaths every year.