NOMATHAMSANQA BANZI

● Welile Banzi was battling flu-like symptoms at home when he learnt that his mother, Nomathamsanqa, 59, had died of suspected Covid-19 in King William’s Town last weekend.

He cannot bury her until the Eastern Cape health department’s Covid tests on his mother are complete.

“What pains me more is the negligence by the department of health. My mother tested positive on April 20 and tested negative on April 30, and we were never informed. We visited her at Grey Hospital. She was discharged and we treated her as a normal diabetic person,” Banzi said.

Then Nomathamsanqa had difficulty breathing and was taken to another hospital where, Banzi said, doctors told him she should never have been discharged from

Grey Hospital. She was retested on April 30 and died on May 3.

“I have been tested and am still awaiting my results. I’m interacting with a number of people trying to prepare for her burial. The funeral parlour has been informed not to release the body until the results are known. She is treated as a Covid-19 death,” he said.

Nomathamsanqa’s nephew and UDM MP Nqabayomzi Kwankwa wrote to provincial premier Oscar Mabuyane about his aunt’s allegedly shoddy treatment.

“We were sent from pillar to post by what seems an incompetent health-care system, which resulted in my aunt paying with her life. The poor level of treatment at Grey … and refusal to treat my aunt leaves much to be desired. They dropped the ball and it had fatal consequences,” he wrote.