Cosatu’s reaction comes after at least 94 psychiatric patients died of negligence last year after they were moved from a licensed home to unregistered facilities, Health Ombudsman Professor Malegapuru Makgoba said on Wednesday, sparking public outrage.
About 1 300 psychiatric patients were moved from a unit of the Life Healthcare Group to charities during last year in a cost-cutting bid by the Department in the Gauteng province.
The ombudsman said that all 27 facilities to which the patients were transferred, operated under invalid licenses. Experts say mental health care takes the backseat in funding and public hospitals do not have enough equipment or staff.
"The decision was unwise and flawed, with inadequate planning and a chaotic and rushed or hurried implementation process," Makgoba said in his report.
Makgoba said the death toll was "a provisional number" and could rise because more people were coming forward with information. He said only one person died from a mental illness.
He recommended that the rest of the patients who had been moved to the unlicensed facilities be transferred to hospitals.
Cosatu is demanding answers from the National Health Ministry, while Gauteng Health MEC, Qedani Mahlangu, having resigned a day before the report was released.
Cosatu has also criticised the ministry for failing to come up with a clear strategy to deal with mentally-ill patients. Cosatu National Spokesperson, Sizwe Pamla, says health is a professional competency and they would like to see heads role in the national Department.
“When it comes to instances like this, it starts with the political leadership. The Minister himself, we really do believe that the Head of the Department in the province and some senior bureaucrats... this bureaucratic bungling is really a mess, and if the African National Congress and its government want to regain some kind of credibility in the eyes of South Africans, they have to restructure and clean house. So for us, the Minister should step down.”
Meanwhile, the South African Federation for Mental Health's Bharti Patel has described the deaths as shocking. In another development, the South African Medical Association has said the MEC and other senior health officials implicated, should be criminally liable for the incidents.
--SABC--
Additional reporting by Reuters
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