Sunday 06, Dec 2025 {HMC}  Health Cabinet Secretary Aden Duale has welcomed the partnership framework between Kenya and the United States of America after holding bilateral talks with the USA’s Secretary of Health and Human Services, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., at the Department of Health and Human Services in Washington, D.C.

Taking to X on Saturday, December 6, 2025, after the seemingly successful talks, CS Duale reaffirmed the strong partnership between the two nations and the shared commitment to achieving Universal Health Coverage (UHC).

Kenya-USA health discussions

”Our discussions focused on four priorities: a fit-for-purpose health workforce, sustainable health financing, secure access to health products and technologies and a resilient, digitised health system. I underscored the need for strong multidisciplinary primary healthcare teams, supported by a well-equipped community health workforce, to deliver quality services at the community and primary care levels,” Duale said.
The Health Cabinet Secretary also highlighted ongoing reforms under the Social Health Insurance (SHI) managed by the Social Health Authority (SHA), which, according to the CS, now covers over 27.6 million Kenyans.

”We explored deeper partnerships with the U.S industry, academia and government to advance technology transfer, regulatory harmonisation and innovation, especially in expanding local production of vaccines, pharmaceuticals and diagnostics,” he added.

Aden Duale welcomed the United States Government’s commitment to the Government-to-Government (G2G) agreement as a vital step in aligning investments with Kenya’s national health priorities.

Ruto hails Kenya-USA partnerships

At the same time, President William Ruto has described his recent engagements in Washington, D.C. as a defining milestone in the long-standing partnership between Kenya and the United States.

Ruto has expressed deep gratitude to President Donald Trump and his administration for what he termed exceptional hospitality and renewed commitment to strategic cooperation. In a statement issued on Saturday, December 6, 2025, after the bilateral discussions, President Ruto said the consultations were productive and represented a watershed moment in the long, strategic friendship between the two nations.

President Ruto highlighted a strengthened partnership in the health sector, noting that Kenya and the United States had agreed on new measures to improve disease surveillance, expand primary healthcare, and accelerate the adoption of advanced medical technologies.

Saturday 6, Dec 2025 {HMC} After a series of killings involving three women on the night of October 21 and the day of October 22, 2024, Hashim Dagane Muhumed, alias Hashim Mohamed Khalif, murdered a fourth woman on the night of October 29 and 30, 2024.

On Wednesday, December 3, 2025, the court heard that on the night of October 29–30, 2024, at Valley Heights Apartments in the Lavington area of Nairobi County, Hashim killed Deka Abdi Noor Gorane.

The prosecution, led by Senior Assistant Director of Public Prosecutions Gikui Gichui, told the court that the accused turned on Deka, his girlfriend, and killed her brutally to conceal evidence of the three previous murders.

The court heard that after killing Deka, Hashim boiled her body parts, placed them in a black wastepaper bag, and later attempted to dispose of her remains at Lang’ata Cemetery.

“The accused girlfriend, Deka Abdi Noor Gorane, was the fourth victim whose body was mutilated, boiled, and the remains dumped at Lang’ata Cemetery,” Prosecutor Gikui told the court.

CCTV footage presented by Corporal Lawrence Kamau, a CCTV expert, revealed chilling details. The footage captured a small car parked on a road at Sixth Avenue, Parklands, at 04:36:58 hours, later reversing and stepping on an object identified as a human body.

The same vehicle was later seen at Valley View Apartments in Parklands on October 22, 2024, at 04:37:11 hours, with two individuals — a man dressed in a white shirt and black trousers, and a woman in a blue garment — walking toward the far left of the camera view.

“At 05:07:18, a small grey motor vehicle is seen parked at the entrance of the building. The man alights, enters, and returns at 05:08:17. At 05:08:21, the lady in the blue garment enters from the passenger’s seat at 05:08:39, after which the car reverses and departs via the same road,” Officer Kamau explained.

On October 29, 2024, Deka was captured at Valley Heights Apartments in Lavington at 09:19 hours, wearing a maroon garment, leaving her apartment and heading toward the lift area.

CCTV footage from Quick Mart supermarket in Lavington, located near the apartment, showed Deka entering the store at 09:19 hours and making payments at the till at 09:37 hours.

At 10:03:49 hours, she was seen returning to the apartment carrying items in a Quick Mart bag and another small black bag with red or pink writing.

On October 31, 2024, at 05:59:50 hours, Hashim, dressed in a black long-sleeved shirt and blue trousers, was captured walking to the lift area while carrying two black bags — a small one in his left hand and a larger one in his right hand.

Officer Kamau noted that the small bag resembled the one Deka had carried back from Quick Mart on October 29, 2024. The accused was also seen checking the bags as he waited for the lift.

“My lady, we observed the man closely inspecting the items he was carrying while waiting at the lift area,” Officer Kamau testified.

Zipporah Ngwatu

Saturday 6, Dec 2025 {HMC} Ilhan Omar, the Somali-born Minnesota congresswoman, has said Donald Trump is lashing out at her and her community with bigotry because he “knows he is failing”.

The US president dismissed Somali Americans earlier this week as “garbage” in a racist rant.

Omar, a Democrat, made the observation in a personal essay published by the New York Times praising the resilience of Somali Americans and condemning the Trump administration for its promise to send federal agents to Minneapolis and elsewhere in her state for immigration enforcement raids.

“The president knows he is failing, and so he is reverting to what he knows best: trying to divert attention by stoking bigotry,” she wrote.

Omar added: “Mr Trump denigrates not only Somalis but so many other immigrants, too, particularly those who are Black and Muslim. While he has consistently tried to vilify newcomers, we will not let him silence us. He fails to realize how deeply Somali Americans love this country.”

Trump delivered a second tirade against Somalis in general, and Omar in particular, following a cabinet meeting on Wednesday. The congresswoman, who is a US citizen, “should be thrown the hell out of our country”, the president said.

Using an inaccurate term for Somalis, he added: “Somalians should be out of here. They’ve destroyed our country. And all they do is complain, complain, complain.”

Omar, in the essay, pointed out that some of her Somali constituents voted for Trump. She suggested that the president’s racial animosity was ingrained, and resurgent now because of a failed domestic policy agenda.

“The president’s dehumanizing and dangerous attacks on minority immigrant communities are nothing new,” she wrote.

“When he first ran for president he launched his campaign with claims that he was going to pause Muslim immigration to this country. He has since falsely accused Haitian migrants of eating pets and referred to Haiti and African nations as ‘shithole’ countries.

“He has accused Mexico of sending rapists and drug peddlers across our border. It is unconscionable that he fails to acknowledge how this country was built on the backs of immigrants and mocks their ongoing contributions.

“While the president wastes his time attacking my community, my state, my governor and me, the promises of economic prosperity he made in his run for president last year have not come to fruition.”

Omar, 43, has been a constant target of Trump and Republicans since arriving Congress in 2019 as one of the first two Muslim women in the chamber. She was previously a state senator in Minnesota and is now part of a group of prominent, progressive Democratic members of the House of Representatives in Washington DC who call themselves “the Squad”.

She was stripped by the Republican majority of her seat on the foreign affairs committee in 2023 for comments critical of Israel.

Omar asserted in her essay that Somali Americans remain resilient against the onslaught of attacks from the White House. But she added: “I am deeply worried about the ramifications of these tirades …

What keeps me up at night is that people who share the identities I hold – Black, Somali, hijabi, immigrant – will suffer the consequences of [Trump’s] words.” She noted that bigotry from the White House so often went unchecked in Washington.

Omar’s essay concluded: “We will not let Mr Trump intimidate or debilitate us. We are not afraid. After all, Minnesotans not only welcome refugees, they also sent one to Congress.”