Twenty-five wedding goers test positive
TWENTY-FIVE KZN wedding goers who ignored lockdown regulations have tested positive for Covid-19, adding to the growing surge of 1 000 new Covid19 infections recorded daily in the province.
During a media briefing yesterday, KwaZulu-Natal Premier Sihle Zikalala warned that the government would strictly impose the lockdown level 3 regulations to clamp down on people attending weddings and parties. The high number of people attending funerals would also not be tolerated, he said.
Zikalala said the government was concerned about infections reported following social gatherings.
“Over the past seven days, we have noted with concern the number of infections reported after people have attended gatherings such as ceremonies and funerals. In most of these engagements, measures like social distancing and the wearing of masks have been disregarded,” Zikalala said.
“We have been made aware that a sizeable group was reported to have attended a wedding last weekend. A number of people from the wedding fell sick, and 25 from the group who attended the wedding tested positive.
“Today, some of them are occupying Covid-19 beds in health-care facilities,” he said.
Zikalala said the province would be guided by scientific analysis and the national leadership regarding enforcing lockdown regulations.
“We are not going to accept meetings such as weddings and parties. These should be scaled down, and if people meet, it should be virtually,” Zikalala said.
He added that the government’s medical and scientific team had projected the province would record more than 200 000 infections by mid-July.
Zikalala said it had been a “very difficult week” during which 98 people in the province had died of Covid-19, while the province was mourning the death of Queen Noloyiso Sandile, the daughter of King Cyprian Bhekuzulu ka Solomon and sister of King Goodwill Zwelithini, as well as the loss of Provincial Legislature member and ANC provincial spokesperson Ricardo Mthembu.
“Each day, we are increasingly being catapulted from being in the eye of the storm towards being firmly entrenched in the middle of a raging and violent hurricane. But this is no time to lose the war. We need to wage a relentless fight against this invisible enemy,” Zikalala said.
KZN had 23 751 positive cases, of which 17 450 were still active; 280 deaths, and 6 021 recoveries as at July 11.
“A week ago, we had 13 984 cases, of which 9 605 were active, 182 deaths, and 4 197 recoveries. This therefore means that in just one week, we have had 9 767 new Covid-19 cases, 98 new deaths, and an additional 1 824 recoveries,” he said.
“KZN is currently on a surge, recording above 1 000 cases daily. We are still the fourth highest-ranking province,” he said.
“We also looked at the projected ICU admissions, which were just above 5 000, and we are sitting at just above 45 patients in ICU and high care,” he said.
However, he said the rise in infections was “worrying”.
He said eThekwini accounted for 53% of cases provincially, and 67.4% (184) of deaths, while the median age of death was 62.
“KwaZulu-Natal recorded its first paediatric death since the beginning of the pandemic. The deceased is a 5-month-old who had been admitted with tuberculosis,” he said.
The most common recorded comorbidities included hypertension (29%) and diabetes mellitus (30%), while the proportion of HIV-infected (8%) deceased had risen.
“The number of deceased with no recorded comorbidities has also increased. There is also an increase in the number of patients who are dying on arrival, as well as home deaths,” he said.
Zikalala said the province currently had 7 111 beds, and more were being created through engaging with private hospitals and the hospitality industry for quarantine beds. Currently, there are 17 450 active cases of which 1 444 patients had been admitted to hospital, and 16 006 were in self-isolation.
“We are also erecting field hospitals, with four expected to be finished by the end of this month. These increases, added with the possibility of oxygen flow in the refurbished hospitals, and the availability of the dexamethasone drug, which is the medicine recently authorised for use in Covid-19-positive patients, makes us feel we will still be able to manage the surge in positive cases,” he said.
He added that at most schools, Grade 6 and Grade 11 pupils had returned to class smoothly.
“We continue to monitor the infection rates at schools. To date, we have 873 cases in KZN schools involving teachers, pupils, staff such as gardeners, grounds people and other officials,” he said.
HEALTH-CARE workers in public hospitals, located in Covid-19 hotspots in KwaZulu-Natal, have raised concerns over bed capacity and the rate at which staff are getting infected.
Edendale Hospital in Pietermaritzburg and Mahatma Gandhi Memorial Hospital in Phoenix were facing an influx of patients.
Staff members at Edendale Hospital protested last week about poor working conditions, including over the shortage of personal protective equipment (PPE), failure to decontaminate affected areas and workers succumbing to the disease.
Sbu Gwamanda, a National Education, Health and Allied Workers’ Union (Nehawu) representative at Edendale Hospital, said two nurses in different wards had died in the past two weeks.
He said following the strike last week, management of the hospital had acted to address some of their concerns. “By Friday, about 16 of the 22 workers were tested and we want more to be tested as numbers of those at risk are growing every day.
“There are still some outstanding issues, like the deep cleaning of the hospital,” he said.
Sources at the hospital claimed that wards set aside to accommodate Covid-19 patients were already full to capacity.
At Durban’s Mahatma Gandhi Memorial Hospital, the situation was serious, according to hospital board member pastor Mervyn Reddy.
He said, to date, the hospital had about 20 staff members who were in self-isolation at home and were waiting for their test results.
“We are testing about 100 people per day. We have about nine ventilators that are all in use. We have about 15 ICU beds and they are all in use, and we have ward 9 – which is for individuals being investigated because they are showing signs of Covid-19 – which is now full,” he said.
He said even the out-patients department was filled with Covid-19 patients who were in serious condition and even the waiting areas close to the ward had been converted into wards, and some beds were placed there.
Democratic Nursing Association of South Africa (Denosa) provincial secretary Mandla Shabane said they feared Mahatma Gandhi Memorial Hospital would run out of bed space soon.
“We also have concerns with personal protective equipment (PPE) sent to some hospitals.
“A batch of masks supplied to medical staff was clearly labelled that it will not protect the staff from infections as these masks are for construction work. We are concerned that sub-standard masks may have been distributed across the province.”
DA MPL Rishigen Viranna said Mahatma Gandhi Memorial Hospital was facing severe staff shortages even before the pandemic, adding that the situation had worsened.
KZN Health MEC Nomagugu Simelane-Zulu said yesterday that different PPE was assigned to staff, depending on their level of exposure.
However, she said the department had received a complaint on Wednesday about poor quality PPE delivered to a facility in eThekwini, which was being investigated.
Simelane-Zulu added that it was not practical to test every staff member in a hospital, if there had only been infections in specific sections.
“In one facility we can have more than 1 000 nurses, so if we are going to test everyone it’s a waste of resources and a waste of time. When we have a positive case, we follow the trace of that health-care worker. We don’t close down the whole hospital,” she said.
However, she said if infections in a hospital were spread across departments, among staff who had not worked together, then the facility would have to be closed.
Simelane-Zulu said it was true that Mahatma Gandhi Memorial Hospital had reached capacity.
“Mahatma Gandhi Hospital is not meant to keep Covid-19 positive patients. Patients go there with other illnesses and are then found to be positive. They are placed in a PUI (patient under investigation) ward and then sent to different facilities,” she said.
She said additional beds had been created to cater for these patients in Wentworth and Clairwood hospitals, and a field hospital was being built in Clairwood.
KZN Premier Sihle Zikalala said yesterday that the government had observed a “disturbing trend” of more than a dozen illegal strikes at hospitals across the province.
“We were informed through the media that the protests were due to, among others, a so-called ‘lack of PPE’ and infections among staff, and the deep-cleaning of workplaces after staff have tested positive,” Zikalala said.
“The most worrying aspect of this protest action is that most of these bones of contention are smokescreens being used by people with ulterior motives,” Zikalala added.
The premier said there had not been a shortage of PPE for months now.