Gauteng public hospitals are filled to the brim and its healthcare workers are overburdened, fatigued, emotionally drained and calling for urgent government intervention.
“We are not coping under normal circumstances. We fight every day and the environment has become most toxic ,” healthcare worker Rich Sicina said on Tuesday.
“Nurses are resigning left, right and centre. Things are out of hand in our facilities.”
Sicina, who works as a nurse in the paediatric ward at Thelle Mogoerane Regional Hospital in Vosloorus, Ekurhuleni, said their calls for intervention at facilities in the province before the pandemic fell on deaf ears.
“Our biggest problems are infrastructure, shortage of staff and shortage of material resources. We had been complaining about a lot of things before the pandemic and then the pandemic worsened things. We were saying add more wards, add more hospitals because the population is growing and that’s why hospitals are overwhelmed.”
Karabo Seema, who works as a nurse at Kalafong Hospital in Pretoria, said: “It’s very difficult and we are trying our best to deal with the sudden rise in infections. We are overburdened.
“In hospitals we are losing a lot of patients and healthcare workers. We are seeing a trend that more young people are dying of Covid-19 than before.”
Seema said she lost three colleagues in recent months due to Covid-19.
“It is very difficult and also the anxiety that comes with it because you think: ‘What if I am next?’ Our mental health is in shreds. We are trying so hard to be focused and learn how to deal with this.
“Every wave comes with a different experience.”
Seema said nurses are being forced to work longer hours and look after more patients.
“It is really hard for healthcare workers right now. A lot of times it speaks to the passion we have for our work and thinking about your colleagues because you are thinking if you are not there, where else are they going to draw their strength?
“Us being together and being there for each other, and the love we have for our work, is why we still report for duty.”
Sicina said: “The wards in this hospital are full. We have two Covid-19-designated wards and they are full. We were told yesterday two wards are going to be emptied and used for Covid-19 patients.
“What is going to happen to those patients with other illnesses?””
Sicina said of a colleague working in a Covid-19 ward: “She was saying it’s tiring. Yesterday [Monday] there were only four on duty in a 32-bed ward that is full to the rafters because some decided to be absent.
“You work almost every day. We are tired. Because things are out of hand, you find yourself looking after 16 patients. One person looking after 16 patients. There is no way you are not going to be frustrated.”
Sicina called on the provincial government to implement stricter lockdown regulations.
“Let’s go to level 5 if push comes to shove. Where I stay in Katlehong there is no social distancing. People are all over the place because they don’t know what is happening in our facilities.”
