The DA in KwaZulu-Natal is saddened by the death of a patient at Clairwood Hospital following a fire at the facility in the early hours of this morning.
According to reports, staff evacuated 24 of the 25 patients and attempted to put out the fire with extinguishers. The cause of the fire is not yet known.
The DA commends hospital staff for their efforts to save patients. It is heartbreaking that they were not able to get everyone out.
Many of KZN’s medical facilities require urgent maintenance and it must be established whether this was a contributing factor to the fire.
The DA – as part of KZN’s government of provincial unity (GPU) – will ensure that there is a comprehensive probe into the cause of the fire. We will also conduct an oversight to Clairwood Hospital in the coming days to see for ourselves.
Our province’s healthcare facilities must look and feel like places of healing. They cannot continue on a trajectory where people dread going there to get better.
With renewed hope in the GPU, the DA is committed to turning this around through rigorous oversight.