Ashley Sauls, the Johannesburg MMC for Health, has blamed illegal immigration for the capacity problems which are faced by the hospitals in Johannesburg. Sauls recorded a video of pregnant women at the Rahima Moosa Mother and Child Hospital on Saturday which showed pregnant women sleeping on the floor.
Sauls shared a video on social media alleging that the women who were seen sleeping on the floor had been there for three days. “There were women that were there for at least three days, and they were just waiting,” Sauls said.
“The only thing that was done, was their blood pressure were taken. It was very, very sad.” Sauls spoke to the matron of the hospital and found out that the hospital was facing a challenge of dealing with undocumented illegal foreign nationals. More than 20 of the patients who were lying on the floor were Zimbabwean nationals.
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The pregnant women cannot be deported back home as their due dates are close. There is a shortage of rooms and beds at the emergency clinic and the heavily pregnant women were told to sleep on the floor or on the seats.
“We need to stop tiptoeing around the real issue, which is illegal immigration. We need to find ways to control it. We can expand hospitals, we can divert patients to other hospitals, but even that approach at some point is not going to help, because then that system becomes overburdened.
“We can’t have a situation where South African citizens are disadvantaged in terms of what their rights are to public health. “Our health systems are overridden due to the overlooking of controlling illegal immigration,” said Sauls.
Source: Jacaranda FM, Opera News, News24, ENCA, Twitter, The Citizen, image from The Citizen of heavily pregnant women sleeping on the floor
