DA decries delayed repairs to cancer machine at Newcastle hospital
The DA in KZN says the provincial health department's ongoing delays in repairing the endoscope machine at Newcastle's Madadeni Hospital only mean prolonged frustration for cancer patients.
The machine is used to diagnose and treat internal bleeding and conditions such as stomach cancers.
The DA's KZN spokesperson for Health, Edwin Baptie, says ailing cancer patients in Newcastle have been forced to go to Pietermaritzburg's Grey's Hospital.
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"Grey's Hospital has its own caseloads, and of course, people waiting in the queue there, they have to be rescheduled. It just compounds in a really bad situation, and it lengthens the backlogs.
"What we are not seeing is backlogs coming down in the province, whether it is for surgical attention or any other kind of service, those backlogs are growing, which means that the management, not just the clinical staff, but the machinery that they need and tools that they need to do their jobs are not adequate."
