Nurses intimidated at another North West hospital

Patients are now being denied healthcare at a third hospital in the North West.

"Taung Hospital is shut down‚" the Rural Health Advocacy Project said on Friday. "Nurses are not allowed in and are being driven from the wards. Few nurses in maternity and neonates. There are no nurses in theatre."

Dr Ndiviwe Mphothulo said patients and nurses at Gateway Clinic‚ next to the Taung hospital‚ were also chased away.

"Poor people will spend the weekend without medication‚" said Mphothulo.

Earlier this week‚ doctors were prevented from entering the Tshepong and Klerksdorp hospitals by striking staff‚ who say they are protesting against a shortage of healthcare workers and alleged corruption in the provincial health department. Community workers and counsellors have also joined them in protest against low remuneration.

In a series of tweets flagging the problems in the North West‚ tagging the national health department and the South African Human Rights Commission‚ amongst others‚ the Rural Health Advocacy Project asked despairingly‚ "Who do we call when all we want is for rural communities to have access to healthcare services? Why should these communities be denied this right?" In the Eastern Cape‚ meanwhile‚ a Twitter user shared that a hospital's laundry was being done by . . . patients!