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Carla Serfontein, 14, died on Monday after contracting necrotic pneumonia.<\/p>\n
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Necrotic pneumonia \u2013 the disease responsible for the death this week of a Pietermaritzburg teenager \u2013 was not \u201crare\u201d, nor was it contagious, the National Institute for Communicable Studies said yesterday. <\/p>\n
The disease was in the spotlight this week, when Pietermaritzburg Girls\u2019 High pupil Carla Serfontein, 14, died on Monday after spending 18 days in an induced coma at Netcare St Anne\u2019s Hospital in Pietermaritzburg. <\/p>\n
She had only been sick for a day before being admitted to hospital in mid-August. <\/p>\n
Dr Lucille Blumberg, of the institute, told The Mercury yesterday that necrotic pneumonia was caused by bacteria, which would result in damage to the tissues of the lungs. <\/p>\n
\u201cNecrotic pneumonia is basically a severe form of pneumonia and it is not contagious at all.\u201d <\/p>\n
Blumberg said the disease was prevalent and described it as something that was a \u201cvery common problem in SA\u201d but not widely reported. <\/p>\n
\u201cCertain patients take antibiotics, get better, overcome the disease and survive while others, unfortunately, die,\u201d she said. <\/p>\n
Since her death, tributes and messages of support have poured in for the teenager, with a Facebook page \u201cPray for Carla Serfontein\u201d having almost 1 000 visits. <\/p>\n
People had donated money, in an effort to raise about R350 000 for Carla \u2013 who has a twin sister \u2013 to receive good medical care while others donated blood. <\/p>\n
During her 18 days at the hospital, people visited her daily, posting messages of support on the Facebook page, at the same time interacting with Carla\u2019s mother, Deirdre Gordon Serfontein. She updated people on a daily basis about her daughter\u2019s condition via the page. <\/p>\n
A week before her daughter died, Serfontein had posted on Facebook: \u201cI got to hospital to see a doctor who looked frayed and nurses and sisters who were absolutely frazzled. <\/p>\n
\u201cThey are tested beyond the call of mere duty. And they are rising to the occasion every shift.\u201d <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Carla Serfontein, 14, died on Monday after contracting necrotic pneumonia. Necrotic pneumonia \u2013 the disease responsible for the death this week of a Pietermaritzburg teenager \u2013 was not \u201crare\u201d, nor was it contagious, the National Institute for Communicable Studies said yesterday. The disease was in the spotlight this week, when Pietermaritzburg Girls\u2019 High pupil Carla […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[8275,953,2143],"class_list":{"0":"post-14429","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-south-africa","7":"tag-durban","8":"tag-newspaper","9":"tag-the-mercury","10":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14429","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14429"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14429\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14429"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14429"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14429"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}