Patient goes missing as tender is delayed
THE failure to award a R100-million hospital laundry tender for Limpopo has come back to haunt the Treasury’s rescue team after a mentally ill patient walked out of a hospital without being noticed while wearing his own civilian clothes.
A Sunday Times investigation has uncovered that patients in all of Limpopo’s 40 hospitals and 500 clinics are forced to wear their own clothes rather than the hospitals’ dirty uniforms and linen.
As a result, on May 20, Johannes Tomu coolly walked past the security guards at the Zebediela Hospital because they mistook him for a day visitor. He is still missing.
According to the hospital’s accident report, seen by Sunday Times reporters, Tomu disappeared a week after being admitted to the regional hospital about 100km southeast of Polokwane.
The report says nurses noticed that Tomu, who is from Zebediela Estate outside Mokopane, was not in his bed that morning when they wanted to take blood samples.
It says Tomu was not with other patients and a search for him was unsuccessful. However, it was reported that he had been seen leaving the hospital in his own clothes. The report says that he boarded a taxi to Motletlane, which neighbours Zebediela.
It says the police in Zebediela and the local clinic had referred Tomu to the hospital. Both promised to help search for the missing patient.
Several sources — including senior civil servants, hospital staff and politicians — said the delay in awarding the laundry contract had led to all medical facilities being compelled to do their laundry at the Polokwane Provincial Hospital. This had resulted in mix-ups of patient clothing in Polokwane, with some either going missing or being returned to the wrong hospitals.
Over the past three weeks, a Sunday Times reporter visited four regional hospitals in Limpopo — Zebediela and Lebowakgomo in the Capricorn district, Letaba in Mopani and Tshilidzini in Vhembe — to establish the severity of the laundry problem.
Patients complained about dirty clothes and a shortage of warm clothes and linen for the cold weather.
James Mabunda, 71, a father of three from Zebediela, said he had trousers and a jacket but no shirt.
“This shortage of clothes is a problem. We are battling here because it’s cold now,” said Mabunda.
A friend, John Molepo, 58, had a shirt and jersey but no trousers. “My family brought me this trouser from home because I had none,” he said.
An official at the Zebediela hospital said administrators were battling to cope with laundry shortages despite sending washing to Polokwane three times a week.
“Sometimes it comes back with some clothes missing, sometimes we get wrong uniforms. There is a lot of mix-up because Polokwane Hospital is not coping,” said the official.
The Treasury intervention team this week said the delay in awarding the contract had been caused by the need to revise it to ensure efficiency and cost effectiveness.
“The intervention is aware of a few hospitals who have had challenges with dysfunctional equipment and are utilising the centralised service,” the team said in a written response to questions.
“Neither the department nor any official has ever indicated that all are affected, and we are not aware of such information. The chief procurement officer [Kenneth Brown] is assisting the department to reform the laundry procurement processes.”
Tiny Rennie, administrator for the Limpopo department of health, said the contract would be awarded only in September.
“We haven’t advertised the tender yet. We are working on it with the chief procurement office. We want to consolidate that and make it one big tender so that we can benefit from the economies of scale.”
Asked about Tomu’s disappearance, the team said Zebediela Hospital was not a psychiatric institution. — Piet Rampedi, Mzikilazi wa Afrika and Stephan Hofstatter