Patients still wait in long queues

Hospital patients will continue to wait in long queues when seeking medical attention if vacant health posts were not filled, Health Minister Manto Tshabalala-Msimang says. 

Tshabalala-Msimang told staff at Mount Fletcher District Hospital in the Eastern Cape that not one of 65 nursing vacancies had been filled since she visited the hospital in June. 

If we don't fill the posts, we'll forever have long queues and our patients will always have to wait.

Tshabalala-Msimang and the several provincial health MECs returned on Thursday to areas where they had identified critical problems during earlier visits in June. 

Mount Fletcher matron Saliswa Madikizela said posts had been advertised by nurses were reluctant to come to places like this which are too rural. 

Mount Fletcher District Hospital serves 250 000 people and has 146 beds, has two full-time doctors and one part-time doctor. 

Tshabalala-Msimang's visit to the Eastern Cape was cut short after the airforce Oryx helicopter in which the delegation and the media were travelling, was grounded by a technical fault. The mission was delayed by four hours as other helicopters were organised to take the group to Mount Fletcher. Scheduled stops at Maluti and Sterkspruit were cancelled.