Digital memorial honours fallen pandemic healthcare heroes
Nomsa Mnguni was contemplating ending her life after she lost her mother - a nurse at a Gauteng state hospital - to Covid-19.
But a digital memorial effort, paying tribute to doctors and nurses who succumbed to the deadly virus, helped save Mnguni’s life by giving her a sense of comfort that her mother Daffodil’s death was not in vain.
It was Johannesburg-based doctor Maggie Mojapelo who devised SA’s first Healthcare Workers Heroes Roll, which appears on YouTube, to “preserve the legacy of decades of dedication by health workers here at home and worldwide who selflessly served and continue to serve humanity with dignity and tenacity”.
Daffodil is one of more 200 healthcare workers who lost their lives to the virus who are honoured on the roll.
As of September 6, 78 doctors appeared on the roll, although not all of them are South African.
“I initiated this project as a health worker in the front line, who noticed that our safety and that of our colleagues – healthcare workers on the front line – was compromised and we were dying at the fastest pace ever imagined,” said Mojapelo.
“When you have a health worker dying, you literally strip the country of a front-line fighter. The doctor-patient ratio in SA is roughly one doctor per 2,500 patients.”
Mojapelo said the self-funded project proved therapeutic and provided meaningful closure for the families and colleagues of those who had sacrificed their lives in the call of duty.
For Mnguni it helped her come to terms with her 54-yearold mother’s death after she contracted Covid-19 while on nursing duty at Tshepong Hospital in Klerksdorp.
The nurse had spread the virus to five family members, including Mnguni’s grandmother who succumbed two weeks before she died. “The roll saved my life. I was suicidal and anxious,” said Mnguni.
“When I saw my mother’s name it gave me that comfort to say that my mother had done her part in saving people’s lives.
“She would want me to live.” The family of Free State doctor Fareed Bux, who also lost his life to Covid-19, said the honour roll made them realise he died serving the community he had dedicated most of his life to helping.
The 66-year-old doctor, who ran a practice in Qwa Qwa for 33 years, contracted the virus from a patient and died three weeks later in hospital.
His 19-year-old son, Muhammad, said: “My dad made many sacrifices on his own part to serve them, and when his community needed him the most, at the dawn of a world-changing pandemic, he was there for them. “Being a doctor was what he lived for and saving lives was his forte. I find comfort in his selflessness. Do I hate the virus? Yes.
“Losing my dad at the age of 19 is going to be the most difficult obstacle of my life. Losing
my dad on the front line only magnifies my admiration and respect for him. He died a hero. And now he’s not only my childhood hero, he is also a nationwide hero,” he said.
“I felt proud when I saw his name on the honours roll. My dad loved what he did. Medicine, being a doctor, was everything for him. His life revolved around being a doctor. I know that my dad has had an honourable and noble death.”
South African Medical Association chairperson Dr Angelique Coetzee said the medical fraternity was devastated by the loss of colleagues.
“Doctors are experiencing post-traumatic stress disorder and burnout but they are just carrying on every day with numbness. In other words, we are struggling to cope but the job carries on every day,” she said.
“The fact is that we don’t actually know how many SA doctors have died.
“Some doctors’ deaths have not been publicly reported, and there are deaths which took place and are not attributed to Covid-19 which may still have been related. We also received additional reports over the next weekend so the numbers continue to grow.
“As of September 11 the department of health reported a cumulative total of 32,429 healthcare workers – all healthcare workers, not just doctors – had been detected with Covid19. Sadly, 257 succumbed to Covid-19,” said Coetzee.