Media Release: Garden Route Health Platform Update

For Immediate Release
21 August 2020

As of 21 August 2020, the Garden Route District has 8200 confirmed cases of Covid-19.

Cases 

Garden Route cases and recoveries per subdistrict.

• Bitou 533 cases; 460 recoveries
• Knysna 1288 cases; 1113 recoveries
• George 3139 cases; 2774 recoveries
• Hessequa 258 cases; 204 recoveries
• Kannaland 99 cases; 70 recoveries
• Mossel Bay 1936 cases; 1608 recoveries
• Oudsthoorn 947 cases; 658 recoveries

The Garden Route has recorded 258 Covid-19 deaths.

Hospitalisation

From our latest available information, there are currently 136 patients admitted in public and private hospitals of which 21 are in High Care/ICU.

 George Hospital happy to discharge more COVID-19 patients

George Hospital has treated 256 COVID-19 patients since the start of the pandemic. Two of these patients are Madelain Ntenetyana and Annestien Botha who both spent a few nights in Ward A1 due to complications of COVID-19.

Thirty-three-year old Madelain Ntenetyana from George started feeling ill at work and thought it was a cold.

She called in sick for work for a few days and her symptoms got worse so she decided to visit her local clinic where she was tested for COVID-19 and sent to hospital. She had difficulty breathing and had no appetite. Madelain says she felt better after three days in hospital and was transferred to PetroSA West Camp for 9 days to complete her isolation period.

“I am grateful for all the staff in the ward and would like to thank them for everything they did for me. I also want to thank especially Nurse Gary Michaels at PetroSA West Camp for his caring attitude while I was there”, she said. Madelain is now fully recovered and would like to call on the public to take COVID seriously as this is an experience she doesn’t want to repeat.

Annestien Botha(33) a nurse from a private hospital in George felt extremely tired and had a temperature. She went to the testing unit at George Hospital where she was tested and admitted to hospital. She was on oxygen for the first night and started feeling better. Being a health professional herself she was impressed with the service received at George Hospital. “ Staff were great, especially the doctors. I could see they have a plan here. I was treated with care and not someone who has an infectious disease where some staff might feel scared to be near you”, she said.

Annestien contracted the virus from her daughter and after being discharged after two days they both isolated together at home.

“It is easy to contract the virus so people should take care of themselves and follow the guidelines such as wearing a mask and social distancing”, she said.

Community Testing and Screening

The approach to active Covid-19 case finding within the rural areas remain that of community testing and screening with a focus on people > 55 years and those with high risk (people with co-morbidities). To date 149 051 people have been screened of whom 1305 have been referred for testing.

 Catching up on the most urgent essential health services without risking patient and staff safety

While the health service platform must remain geared to deal with COVID-19 pandemic (including a possible second wave of infections), the Department of Health wants to scale up essential health services in a balanced manner.   The Department’s risk and impact based approach is guiding the services to be reintroduced identifying those services which have low risk yet high impact (such as immunisation services). These services which had reduced significantly during the COVID pandemic, will have a significant long term impact for those clients who had missed immunisations, follow-up appointments and scheduled non-emergency treatment.    A phased approach will be adopted to return the comprehensive health service platform back to a new normal and will be considered in short, medium and long terms.

PLEASE NOTE THAT CURRENTLY ALL PREVENTATIVE SERVICES ARE OFFERED:

• Women’s health (family planning, antenatal and post-natal care)
• Men’s health
• Child health(immunisations)
• Chronic disease management (TB, HIV, Diabetes, etc.)

Isolation and quarantine

People who cannot isolate or quarantine safely at home (risk to themselves or exposure risk to others), can be referred to an isolation or quarantine facility.

Isolation facilities are for patients who have been infected with the COVID-19 virus (with mild to moderate symptoms) where they can recover. Quarantine facilities are for those have been exposed and are awaiting test results. These facilities are safe, have been made as comfortable as possible and you will receive free transport, meals, and a laundry service. PetroSA (West Camp) is currently the only activated isolation and quarantine facility in the Garden Route. More facilities have been identified and will be activated, if and when the need arises or capacity is exceeded at PetroSA. We currently have 71 people at the West Camp facility.

5 ways to stay safe

We urge all citizens to remain careful in observing these precautions of hygiene and safety.

1. Wear your mask as all times when you leave your home
2. Keep you social distance from other (1.5m)
3. Do not touch your face
4. Wash your hands regularly with soap and water or hand sanitizer(70% alcohol base)
5. If sick, stay home

Make sure you wear your mask when going out to protect yourself and others. Also remember that spitting is another means of transporting the virus. Do not spit on the ground. The protection and wellbeing of all our people remains in our collective hands.

-END-

Nadia Ferreira
Principal Communications Officer
Garden Route and Central Karoo Districts
Western Cape Government Health
Town Clinic, Plettenberg Bay
Tel: 076 379 5423
Email: Nadia.Ferreira@westerncape.gov.za 
Website: www.westerncape.gov.za

Feature image: iStock.com/ra2studio