More than plaster to fix rural healthcare

Written by Kathryn Cleary, Zizo Zikali

While citizens gear up to cast their votes, some lie in hospital waiting areas hour after hour in dire need of quality care. For some, a trip to the hospital may seem like a breeze, but for others, particularly in the rural Eastern Cape, a hospital visit can be a herculean task.

Despite years of intervention at Holy Cross Hospital in Flagstaff, Eastern Cape, there is still a long way to go. Though government emergency interventions have made some impact, for Holy Cross a much more permanent solution is needed. Interventions in 2013 and 2017 have created a plaster over the issues, but the single bucket filled with water in the hospital’s waiting area tells a different story. Holy Cross Hospital highlights the systemic failures of the rural public healthcare system – it will take much more than a bucket and a plaster to fix.

Ahead of the 2019 elections, Spotlight and Health-e journalists worked together to see if anything had really changed at the hospital after the interventions in 2013 and 2017. Although our journalists were denied permission to formally visit the hospital by the Department of Health; patients and community members outside the hospital premises were willing to speak.

The main entrance to Holy Cross Hospital, 23km from the centre of Flagstaff, Eastern Cape. (Picture: Kathryn Cleary/ Spotlight).

Sizakele Theophilus Hlongwana is the local Ward Councillor; residents within his ward were behind protest action in 2017 which lead to an intervention by the MEC. “Post 2017 community strike there has been a slight change”, said Hlongwana. “Waiting hours have been reduced depending which day of the week it is.”

One patient told Health-e that there must be a shortage of beds at the hospital because patients were forced to sleep on benches in the waiting area.

Ntuthuzelo Maganya of Mtshayelo Village had a serious head injury in January of this year and was rushed to hospital.

“On arrival, I was put on a drip and told to move from the bed to a bench so that a patient who is sicker could have the bed.”

“I stayed there all night waiting for the doctor who arrived around 7 am. The doctor attended to me and transferred me to Nelson Mandela Hospital, I slept for the second night on the bench while I was waiting for an ambulance to Mthatha.”

Maganya was not the only person to complain about a shortage of beds and sleeping on benches. During an evening visit to the hospital, several families were spreading blankets out on the floor in order to sleep, anxiously waiting for ambulances and transport vehicles to Mthatha. Mthatha is over 160kms away, almost 3 hours on steep winding roads.

One family declined to speak, fearing they would lose their spot on the next available ambulance.

A patient transport vehicle arrived at the hospital by 8:30 pm that evening, dropping off a full load of patients and their family members.

A birds-eye view of Holy Cross Hospital, 23km from the centre of Flagstaff, Eastern Cape. Spotlight and Health-e were denied permission to visit the hospital by the Department of Health. Photo: Kathryn Cleary/Spotlight.