No fuel to transport farm attack victims to hospital

01 Feb 2016 | Admin Author

Civil rights group, Afriforum, has lashed out at Eastern Cape Health Authorities following claims that an ambulance did not have enough fuel to take farm attack victims to hospital in Queenstown on Wednesday night.

Afriforum's Head of Community Safety, Ian Cameron, says two people were injured in the attack in the Ugie / Maclear area, one on the lung and the other on the leg.

He told Algoa FM News that they were offered temporary medical assistance in Maclear, even though there is no doctor available there, because the ambulance did not have enough fuel to take them to the hospital in Queenstown.

The Eastern Cape Health Department has admitted that a mix-up with petrol cards at the start of the new financial year led to Emergency Medical Services in the Joe Gqabi District Municipality unable to fuel their ambulances.

The matter came to light this week when civil rights group Afriforum reported that a farm attack victim could not be transported to hospital in Queenstown because the ambulance had no fuel.

Bhisho Health Department spokesperson, Sizwe Kupelo, says it transpired that a Transport Department Official in Aliwal North, who had received the fuel cards for the District Municipality, sat on them for at least three weeks before they were distributed on Thursday.

He says the delay in the distribution of the petrol cards was also not brought to the attention of Health Authorities in Bhisho so that contingency plans could have been made to ensure that service delivery was not affected.

"There is an element of negligence in that the cards, when they were collected from the Department of Transport, those that were supposed to be distributed to EMS in Joe Gqabi where missing and they were told the cards will be sent at a later stage. It only transpired on Thursday that the cards were actually available and given to the Department of Transport in Aliwal North. The only forwarded those cards on Thursday to help officials" he said

Kupelo told Algoa FM News that the matter will be taken up with the Eastern Cape Department of Transport.

"The matter will be taken up with the Department as well as the officials involved, because anything that threatens service delivery has to be attended to. The unfortunate occurrence is the fact that they have allowed this situation to go on for too long until someone's life was put at risk" he said