MBOMBELA – Mpumalanga MEC for Health, Sasekani Manzini, welcomed the 13 Cuban Doctors deployed to the province on 19 May at Rob Ferreira Hospital Resource Centre in Mbombela.
Health Minister Dr Zweli Mkhize has said that the Cuban medical brigade has come at the South African government’s request; “the Cuban doctors are coming at our request to reinforce as they have strength in community treatment. Our model is about ‘if you are sick, you go to the hospital’. Cuba has a different model.”
The Democratic Alliance leader in Mpumalanga, Jane Sithole; has criticized this decision citing numerous critical health care vacancies yet to be filled in the Mpumalanga province and also questioning the rationale behind the government’s decision. Sithole has, however, welcomed the additional resources being provided.
The South African Medical Association is of the view that this move is a bit premature as internal resources are still available. “There are a lot of doctors that have been retired that one can rope in. They at least have a lot of experience and they have a lot of wealth and knowledge…would have loved to have first seen them being approached,” commented Dr Angelique Coetzee.
Rob Ferreira Hospital in Nelspruit where the Cuban Doctors will be stationed has had numerous reports of lack of service delivery and also no running hot water. DA’s Jane Sithole has said that, “this is the result of massive scale corruption in the Mpumalanga Provincial Health Department; they can’t even fix the geysers because they are still fighting who must get the tender.”
Johnny Wedderspoon, a supposed patient at Rob Ferreira Hospital, recently posted on Twitter expressing his dissatisfaction saying, “…I tried to send an email to the dept. of health but to no avail. My complaint is we have one of the biggest hospitals in Mbombela but there is no hot water in this hospital. The staff must bring their own kettles from home to make hot water for some of the patients to be washed. Some of us must shower in ice-cold water and it is changing of seasons.”
Rob Ferreira Hospital recently launched the first National Health Laboratory Services test for Covid-19. The test is done using the GeneXpert molecular diagnostic machine. The GeneXpert tests detect the SARS-CoV-2 virus or genetic material from the virus based on the PCR methodology.
Questions sent to Mpumalanga Department of Health were not responded to by the time this article went for publication.
