A war of words has erupted between the mother of a Khayelitsha woman who has tested positive for Covid-19 and the MEC for Health Nomafrench Mbombo.
This is the first recorded case of Covid-19 in Khayelitsha.
The mother claims her 25-year-old daughter was not being treated properly by the nursing staff at Khayelitsha hospital.
The woman and her daughter are under quarantine at the hospital.
She claimed that her daughter, who was diagnosed last weekend, was not taken into quarantine on time but locked in an isolation room.
But Ms Mbombo has heavily criticised the mother for her comments and posting every move concerning her daughter’s illness on Facebook.
MEC Mbombo appealed to her to allow all the processes to take its place so her daughter can recover.
The stressed and distraught mother felt the fact that her daughter was left for three days in an isolation room in Khayelitsha hospital could make it difficult for her to recover.
She said the minute she arrived at the hospital after being called, she questioned the staff’s attitude towards her daughter.
She said the hospital and its nursing staff seem scared to treat her daughter.
“May they treat her with more respect and better care than what they are doing. They shout at her and she is left to be alone with no medical attention. It was traumatising to hear them shout at her, hayi suka, uzakusosulela ( go away, you will infest us) when she tried to go to the loo,” the distraught mother told Vukani.
She further accused the hospital staff of not giving her daughter enough attention.
“I needed to be there all the time, to give her medication. There was no medical attention at all. I have to run around and yet we have nurses,” she said.
She claimed to have reported the matter to the MEC.
Ms Mbombo said she was disappointed at the comments because she had been in telephonic contact with the mother. She said the daughter was attended to immediately and is in quarantine together with her mother.
She said her department had heard that the woman’s landlord was chasing her away after hearing that she was diagnosed with the virus. “My staff had to rush to her and take her to hospital. But what was strange, on Monday morning I had messages from ANC members about my department neglecting her. They are politicising the whole case,” she said.
Ms Mbombo said the patient and her daughter are doing well where they are quarantined.
She said on the accusation that staff had shouted at the woman, she had rebuked the staff and condemned their reaction.
She said this was the staff’s first case of Covid-19. She compared it to the first days of the HIV/Aids pandemic when people reacted with shock.
She, however, criticised and warned the mother to stop using social media to comment about her daughter’s illness. “She is making it difficult for the clinicians if she keeps posting lies on Facebook about the situation of her daughter. She is disturbing the healing process too. They were accessed and are both fine,” said Ms Mbombo.