Premier Refilwe Mtshweni-Tsipane said the government is concerned with the state of affairs within the hospitals in Mpumalanga, both inside and out.
She said the unannounced visits she conducted last week revealed quite a number of weaknesses within these healthcare facilities.
On Monday, Mtshweni-Tsipane embarked on a clean-up programme of tertiary hospitals in the province.
Her first visit was at Rob Ferreira Hospital, and she was accompanied by the MEC for health, Sasekani Manzini.
“If the state of affairs is like this, you can imagine what other things we are lacking,” said Mtshweni-Tsipane.
During her visit to Rob Ferreira, she listed a number of things that were not in order. “There are trees that were cut. We do not know for how long they have been there. Those can easily catch fire and the facility can be endangered. Those are things we want to encourage our officials to pay attention to.
“We are cleaning the hospital so that we can get back to the basics. Rob is not the only one we will be visiting. To me, hospitals are about hygiene, and if they are not in a good state, you can imagine what impact that will have on our patients. This is one of our tertiary hospitals – if it’s in this state, what about the others?
“We will be going to almost all of them. We will be going to Themba Hospital, as far as Gert Sibande, and Witbank in Nkangala Region. We have a plan to appoint 299 Expanded Public Works Programme workers. Currently we have appointed 144, and we are still going to appoint 155.”
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She said they will be having a meeting with the management of Rob.
“If we find reluctance to doing work, we will not hesitate to take action against those who were implicated in such attitude and behaviour.”
The premier said the supply of ingestible medicine is not a problem. “We went through a transition in which we had to change the contractor, and it caused delays in certain areas, so we were not in accordance with 100 % of provision of medication. The only challenge that we still have is surgical – we are currently on 85% supply. The depo has improved in handing out medicine and the method they are using now has improved a lot. They communicate with hospitals and the delivery is done on time.”
She said they are aware of the challenges related to infrastructure at health facilities.
“We are currently renovating Robs, building Mapulaneng Hospital, Middelburg Hospital, and we will soon be commencing with Witbank Tertiary Hospital.”
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Dr Banele Nkosi, chairperson of Mpumalanga South African Medical Association Trade Union, said issues they face in the province as doctors are the shortage of medicine, and many other matters besides, which affect their work.
“We understand that the depo went through a transition, but the issue has been going on for several months. Mainly the shortage of injectables class 2 products, if a patient goes to the hospital, which means the clinic could not help. We are failing to render services, we are rendering suboptimal services due to lack of those medications.
“As a union, we are planning to engage the HOD, MEC and premier. If we fail to render the service we took an oath to do at 100 %, patients’ conditions may worsen. They can sue us and increase litigation. We want to engage the government so that they can stabilise the doctor and patients ratio. Most hospitals run on skeleton staff. Specialists need support staff, and due to the lack of it, they end up leaving. We do not have enough ambulances and emergency personnel.”
