Postmortem of Life Esidimeni saga
Families want results released of cause of death
Christine Nxumalo’s sister Virginia Machpelah died at Precious Angels NGO – likely of pneumonia and dehydration on August 17 last year – after she was forcibly removed from a Life Esidimeni home for the mentally ill.
But Nxumalo has still not received the postmortem 10 months later.
Together with NGO Section27‚ family members whose loved ones had mental illnesses and stayed at Life Esidimeni held a media conference in Braamfontein, Johannesburg, yesterday to detail progress in implementing health ombudsman Malegapuru Makgoba’s recommendations.
Members of the Gauteng health department were invited but did not attend.
Makgoba compiled a report after more than 100 psychiatric patients died following their removals from Life Esidimeni .
He recommended that all NGOs which looked after patients be shut down and police investigate the NGOs where patients died.
Family members complained that there had been delays in the police inquests into the deaths and no arrests have been made.
The family members and Section27 noted that:
Legally required contracts
● were not in place between the Gauteng health department and Selby Park Clinix and Life Esidimeni, who care for about 800 mentally ill patients.
Members of the Mental
●
Health Review Board that oversaw the disastrous move are still in their jobs‚ although the chairperson was removed.
There have been 10 deaths
● since Makgoba’s report in February and the reasons are not known, even though postmortems were done in most cases.
Many families of the 100 patients
● who died have not received the postmortem results.
Family members used the media conference to call for quicker inquests into the deaths. “Justice delayed is justice denied‚” said head of the family committee Andrew Pietersen.
“We are really angry‚” said Lucas Mogwerane‚ whose brother died at an NGO last June. His brother’s death certificate said he died of natural causes‚ but Mogwerane disputes this.
The ombudsman determined that nearly every death – as a result of the move – was unnatural.
Section27 spokesperson Nomvula Nonjabe said thatSouth African Police Services are “dangerously slow” to respond to the inquest.
Section27 confirmed that all of the 800-or-so patients, except 29, have been moved back into Life Esidimeni. Twenty of the 27 NGOs remain open with other patients.
The families of the remaining patients staying in unlicensed NGOs refuse to move them as they do not want to destabilise them.
Nxumalo said some of the families did not trust the department following the initial move.
‘‘ SAPS are dangerously slow to respond