General
Rising coronavirus cases, limited staff take South Africa’s hospitals to brink of collapse
At the Retreat Community Health Centre in Cape Town, most patients who present with COVID-19 have mild symptoms.
Key points:
- Doctors says South Africa’s hospital system is on the brink of collapse
- Healthcare workers are already having to decide who to allocate scarce resources to
- An alcohol ban over New Year’s Eve brought welcome relief to hospital staff
Clinicians on duty offer them paracetamol and send them home.
But over the past few weeks, a growing number of people have come to the clinic struggling to breathe.
“What they need is oxygen and they need it quickly,” senior medical officer Andrea Mendelsohn said.
The clinic currently has 10 oxygen canisters, and five or six people every day rely on them to breathe.
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