A massive increase of psychiatric patients at Helen Joseph Hospital in Johannesburg has resulted in 32 staff members being assaulted since the beginning of the year. There also has been extensive damage to property at the hospital.
This is according to Gauteng health MEC Nomathemba Mokgethi who responded to a query from Jack Bloom, the DA Gauteng shadow health MEC in a written reply. The psychiatric patients are reported to have caused “extensive damage to property” at the hospital. Mokgethi said the fire which broke out at the Charlotte Maxeke Hospital, drugs and the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic are the causes of such a huge number of psychiatric patients at Helen Joseph.
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There have been reports of nurses being bitten and hit by psychiatric patients. “A guard was stabbed with a knife and ended up in casualty with a collapsed lung. His assailant escaped from the psychiatric ward, but was apprehended by police at the hospital entrance. A psychiatric patient picked up a wheelchair and tried to throw it at a staff member, breaking off a bar from his bed and wielded it as a weapon. Other staff members had reportedly being scratched and molested by patients,” Mokgethi said.
According to Mokgethi the hospital has attempted to discharge psychiatric patients who are seen as less of a danger to themselves and other people to make way for others, despite the fact that they are not well yet. There is a shortage of beds, and the hospital is in need of more security and nurses as the number of patients increases.
Source: News24, Times Live, Sowetan Live, image from Sowetan Live
