Please find an attached soundbite by Michele Clarke MP.
The DA has highlighted the increasing desperate conditions at the Chris Hani Baragwanath Hospital in Gauteng since the start of the year, yet there has been no intervention from the Gauteng Health Department or Gauteng Premier David Makhura.
The hospital has reportedly been without adequate food supply for three weeks. Without doctors and nurses pooling their own funds, the patients would not have been fed. Doctors also cannot treat patients with oral medication if patients have not eaten. Without intervention, we could soon be facing another Life Esidemeni disaster.
The hospital is also set to lose 400 posts due to the non-renewal of temporary Covid-contracts. Management has also failed to pay service providers, interns and over-time.
The DA will:
- be doing an urgent oversight visit to Baragwaneth Hospital on Monday;
- we will report all findings to the South African Human Rights Commission (SAHRC);
- we have written to the chairperson of the parliamentary portfolio committee on health, Dr Kenneth Jacobs, as well as the director-general (DG) of the Department of Health, Nicholas Crisp, address this situation as a matter of urgency; and
- have submitted an urgent complaint to the health ombudsman.
The DA will do everything in our power to ensure this situation is rectified immediately. Not only are the dignity and health of the patients severely affected, but the well-being of the Baragwanath-staff must also be addressed. Conditions of being chronically understaffed, while the hospital’s financial mismanagement borders on the criminal need to be addressed.