Western Cape alcohol-related medical emergencies spike since booze ban lifted

Liquor sales have been allowed since Monday under lockdown level 3. Picture: Courtney Africa/African News Agency(ANA)

Liquor sales have been allowed since Monday under lockdown level 3. Picture: Courtney Africa/African News Agency(ANA)

Published Jun 5, 2020

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Cape Town - A spike in alcohol-related medical emergencies since the unbanning of liquor sales has already affected the province’s response to Covid-19, according to the Western Cape Health Department.

Keith Cloete, head of provincial health, said: “I can confirm that our alcohol-related incidents of admission to emergency rooms and trauma units have gone up in the last four days.

“We don’t have an absolute number of the cases but I have got reports from Groote Schuur, Tygerberg and all the other metro hospitals that all such cases have increased.

“The problem with these alcohol-related admissions for trauma at the emergency units is that many of them require emergency surgery. It means the patients also need to have access to the ICU.

“This is where the big challenge comes, because at the moment the ICU capacity has almost been reserved for Covid-19 patients. We shouldn't have alcohol trauma-related cases bringing competition for ICU care,” he added.

On Thursday, the provincial Covid-19 dashboard showed 1 822 new cases since midday on Wednesday, bringing the number of confirmed cases in the Western Cape to 26 386.

The dashboard also indicated 14 917 recoveries while 179 247 tests have been conducted.

Also speaking at the provincial government's daily briefing on the pandemic, Premier Alan Winde said as many as 18 testing and acute-care facilities have been built in the Western Cape, with another 14 and 20 planned for the metro and non-metro regions respectively.

Winde said: “These triage centres help to ease the pressure on emergency rooms while also allowing a dedicated space for screening and testing to occur, away from the hospital’s day-to-day activities.”

On what measures the provincial government has taken to increasing testing capacity, he added: “We are using private labs via the National Health Laboratory Service when they have spare capacity.

"However, there is also growing demand in the private sector given the increased number of cases in the country.

“We are pursuing an additional contractual relationship with private laboratories, and we have also started exploring testing capacity at university laboratories with the support of the Solidarity Fund, and we are in regular communication with the national government on the need for testing kits brought into the country.”

@MwangiGithahu

[email protected]

Cape Argus

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