More grief for mother of daughter who died at Helen Joseph Hospital

4 August 2021

I am appalled that the Helen Joseph Hospital has lost the clothes of a patient who died there in terrible circumstances last week, while the grieving family needs to bury her in these clothes for cultural reasons.

This has added to the heartbreak of Ms Nqobile Dube whose 26-year-old critically ill daughter, Sichelesile, died in a wheelchair at the hospital’s casualty after staff ignored her for more than a day.

Dube wanted to bury her on Friday, but the hospital did not supply the clothes and Dube could not find her daughter’s belongings in a room that she was shown with a pile of clothes.

According to Dube, it would be disrespectful to her family and ancestors to bury her without these garments.

It is unbelievable that the hospital continues to bungle this matter with gross insensitivity to the traumatised family.

They need to know why the hospital did not make every effort to save Sichelesile's life, instead of totally ignoring her as she suffered in her wheelchair.

I hope that hospital management learns from Sichelesile’s death to ensure that nothing like this ever happens again.

Issued by Jack Bloom, DA Gauteng Shadow Health MEC, 4 August 2021