Cape Town – The Employment and Labour Department is preparing to carry out an inspection of Tygerberg Hospital after health-care worker unions called for it to be shut “to avoid a brewing catastrophe which will derail the country's fight against Covid-19”.
In a statement yesterday, Hospersa, a union of more than 60 000 health-care workers in the public and private health care sectors, together with its federation, the Federation of Unions of South Africa (Fedusa), said they had conducted a preliminary inspection of the hospital and were convinced the hospital had direct potential of becoming the major breeding ground and killing field for Covid-19.
“The inspection revealed a plethora of dangerous levels of reckless violations of fundamental Covid-19 protocols, which includes the general public and visitors walking into the facility unchecked and unscreened, Covid-19 patients not being quarantined safely enough from transmitting the virus further, as well as casual movement of deceased patients who have passed on due to this deadly virus.
"Tygerberg Hospital is the largest hospital in the country’s Covid-19 epicentre, the Western Cape, and has reportedly seen more than 150 health workers testing positive for Covid-19 and four deaths,” Hospersa said.
The union's provincial chairperson, Gerald Lotriet, said: “We were shaken by the increasing number of positive Covid-19 cases among the hospital’s staff and instituted a preliminary investigation.”