Just over a year after the Charlotte Maxeke Academic Hospital was gutted by a devastating fire, its accident and emergency unit is finally back up and running.
But it’s not taking any walk-ins just yet.
The unit was officially reopened on Monday, with Health Minister Joe Phaahla marking the occasion with a visit to the hospital.
Phaahla led a delegation, including his deputy Sibongiseni Dhlomo and Gauteng Health MEC Nomathemba Mokgethi, on a walkabout to assess the progress made on repairs so far.
Afterwards, he confirmed that the busy accident and emergency unit was now officially open again. But he cautioned that for now it was only taking new admissions by arrangement.
One of the reasons for the delay in getting back into full swing has to do with a CT scanner, which was vandalized.
The minister said, however, that he and his team were hopeful it would be repaired by the end of the week and that the hospital would be able to start accepting ambulances as soon as this was done.
OBSTETRICS, GYNAECOLOGY NEXT
With repairs to the fire-ravaged hospital’s accident and emergency unit now complete, Phaahla said the department’s focus would now turn to the obstetrics and gynaecology department.
The minister said next on the list was the hospital’s maternity department, the repairs of which were expected to be completed by the end of March 2023.
He said repairs to the hospital’s paediatrics, surgery, and internal medicine units meanwhile would be completed by July, October, and November 2023.
“So all the work of the rehabilitation, we hope everything goes according to plan, will be completed by December next year, which is a major improvement from the previous projections. As some of you may be aware that initially, this work was projected to take a lot longer time. But now where we are, it will just be about a year and seven months. In that period, the whole work will be completed.”
-EWN
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