{"id":234427,"date":"2022-08-17T21:16:32","date_gmt":"2022-08-17T19:16:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.groundup.org.za\/article\/people-queue-all-night-to-fetch-their-chronic-meds-at-clinic-in-gqeberha\/"},"modified":"2022-08-17T21:16:32","modified_gmt":"2022-08-17T19:16:32","slug":"people-queue-all-night-to-get-their-chronic-medication","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/people-queue-all-night-to-get-their-chronic-medication\/","title":{"rendered":"People queue all night to get their chronic medication"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"article_body\">\n<p><a class=\"bigger-image\" href=\"https:\/\/www.groundup.org.za\/media\/uploads\/images\/photographers\/Mkhuseli%20Sizani\/nu11_clinic.jpeg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><img decoding=\"async\" alt src=\"http:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/08\/people-queue-all-night-to-get-their-chronic-medication.jpg\"><\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"caption\">Patients queue outside the clinic in Motherwell, Gqeberha, from 1am in order to be among the 100 people served each day. They burn rubbish to keep themselves warm. Photo: Mkhuseli Sizani<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Patients queue all night to be treated at the clinic in Motherwell NU11, Gqeberha.<\/li>\n<li>The community says another clinic is urgently needed in NU29.<\/li>\n<li>The provincial department of health says it has appointed three additional staff members for the clinic.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>The sick, the infirm, the elderly, and patients collecting chronic medication wait all night, outside in the cold, at the clinic in Motherwell NU11, Gqeberha.<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" alt class=\"leave\" height=\"1\" id=\"gu_counter\" src=\"http:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/08\/people-queue-all-night-to-get-their-chronic-medication.gif\" width=\"1\"><\/p>\n<p>GroundUp met people who queue from as early as 1am, hoping to be seen the same day. They burn rubbish from an illegal dump site nearby to keep warm, and they wait, wrapped in blankets, sitting on paint buckets and bricks.<\/p>\n<p>The clinic opens at 7:30am. People in the community say only the first 100 people have a chance of being seen. Patients say it is overcrowded but understaffed, and a second clinic is needed in NU29, about three kilometres away.<\/p>\n<p>NU29 is a new informal settlement where the Nelson Mandela Bay Municipality has relocated people from various wetlands across the metro. This has strained the NU11 clinic.<\/p>\n<p>Siphiwo Dayimani, ward 54 community leader, said NU29 now has over 1,000 shackdwellers in addition to families living in RDP houses.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThen we have NU11, NU12 A, B and C and NU30, which all depend on Motherwell NU11 Clinic. So we are talking about thousands of people in this ward who are solely depending on one clinic. They are turned back home daily because the mobile clinic is also not coping with these numbers,\u201d said Dayimani.<\/p>\n<p>Dayimani said successive MECs for health had been informed but nothing had been done.<\/p>\n<p>Madiba Qandana, who was queuing at the clinic, said there ought to at least be a booking system. \u201cI was turned back home three times last month because I had arrived at 6am. Today, I arrived here at 3am in order to be assisted,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<p>Mninikhaya Tive was among those who arrived at 1am. He was queueing for someone who lives far away. He will charge her R30 for keeping her place until the clinic opens. \u201cI have been doing this for three years because it helps me to put bread on the table for myself because I am unemployed,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<p>Melumzi Mankayi, who lives across the road, arrived at 2am. He is also a paid placeholder. \u201cI have two children and I am unemployed,\u201d he said. \u201cI made this arrangement with patients who kept on being turned away.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Nolungile Nondwangu, 70, said, \u201cFor three months I have not received my hypertension and diabetes treatment because the clinic is always full \u2026 In the past, all the pensioners like me were allowed to get inside and take their medication. But through frustration, other patients say we must also learn to wake up early and queue like them. I am tired and dizzy because I did not eat.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Yonela Dekeda, spokesperson of the provincial health department, said, \u201cThe department is not aware that the facility turns patients away. This matter will be investigated.\u201d Dekeda said the department had appointed three additional staff members for the NU11 clinic.<\/p>\n<p>Dekeda said there are no plans to build a clinic in NU29, but the area is served by a mobile clinic twice per week.<\/p>\n<p>But patients told GroundUp they cannot get chronic medication at the mobile clinic.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<div id=\"article_copyright\">\n<p>\u00a9 2022 GroundUp. This article is licensed under a <a href=\"http:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by-nd\/4.0\/\" rel=\"license\">Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>You may republish this article, so long as you credit the authors and GroundUp, and do not change the text. Please include a link back to the original article.<\/p>\n<p>We put an invisible pixel in the article so that we can count traffic to republishers. All analytics tools are solely on our servers. We do not give our logs to any third party. Logs are deleted after two weeks. We do not use any IP address identifying information except to count regional traffic. We are solely interested in counting hits, <b>not tracking<\/b> users. If you republish, please do not delete the invisible pixel.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/08\/people-queue-all-night-to-get-their-chronic-medication.jpg\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.groundup.org.za\/\">Source: GroundUp<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Patients queue outside the clinic in Motherwell, Gqeberha, from 1am in order to be among the 100 people served each day. They burn rubbish to keep themselves warm. Photo: Mkhuseli Sizani Patients queue all night to be treated at the clinic in Motherwell NU11, Gqeberha. The community says another clinic is urgently needed in NU29. 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