Daily News reports that more than 50 staff members at Addington Hospital in Durban tested positive for Covid-19 in the past three weeks, with about 20 more said to be waiting for their results.
These staff members include nurses and doctors, as well as administration staff and senior officials of some departments in the facility’s causality and human resources units. Apparently, from 23 November until last Wednesday, 45 staff members tested positive, while 10 more tested positive on Thursday. But, there there has been no formal communication from management to staff on the increasing cases. Besides the worrying lack of communication, allegedly there has been no shutdown or disinfecting in areas where staff who tested positive worked. National Education, Health and Allied Workers’ Union (Nehawu) provincial secretary Ayanda Zulu said they were aware that there had been an outbreak of Covid-19 cases among Addington Hospital staff. In the past few weeks the union has been holding pickets at the hospital because a number of lifts at the hospital were not working. “There are two lifts working where patients and staff are overcrowded in these particular lifts and that on its own poses a risk,” said Zulu. He indicated that the union had requested an urgent meeting with the KZN Health Department to discuss the state of Addington Hospital.
- Read the full original of the report in the above regard by Anelisa Kubheka at Daily News
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