Is this the level of service residents can expect from the Louis Trichardt Memorial Hospital?

This is the question after a man collapsed in the hospital garden last Wednesday (15/02) and was left unattended for almost seven hours by both hospital and security staff.

The man, who was later identified as a Zimbabwean, collapsed right next to the pathway leading to the nursing manager’s office and emergency rooms. Covered in his own faeces, he was too weak to get himself into the hospital building.

The Paquot couple, Julian and Dienie, spotted the man in the garden when they visited their domestic worker and her child, who had been bitten by a snake.

According to Julian, they noticed the man early in the morning when they brought the child to the hospital. By 17:00 that afternoon, when they brought food and clothes for the domestic worker, the man was still lying on the grass in agony. Nobody, it seemed, took any notice of him.

Hospital staff were approached, but they allegedly told the couple that they could only help people when they booked themselves into the hospital.

“How can they act this way? The man is lying in their garden – it’s supposed to be a hospital,” Dienie remarked.

Security guards also shrugged their shoulders and told the couple that “it was not their [security's] job to help patients.” Everyone, including the nurses, refused to supply their names when Julian requested them to do so.

Eventually the matter was brought to the Zoutpansberger’s attention, but when the newspaper arrived at the hospital, the man had just been moved inside. It was later established that the man died five days later.

Another big question is whether the man’s nationality had something to do with the fact that he was not assisted. Judging by one security guards comment, xenophobia might have played a role. The guard was caught on video referring to the suffering man as a “f*#king Zimbabwean”. Off camera, he also laughed at the photograph of the man covered in his own faeces that Julian had taken as proof.

Following the incident, the provincial Department of Health and Social Development was approached for comment. A copy of the photograph taken was also made available to the office of MEC Dikeledi Magadzi.

On Tuesday, departmental spokesperson Mr Joe Maila confirmed that the man, aged 39, had died on Monday. According to him, the man had suffered from extra-pulmonary tuberculosis. “He was seriously ill and did not respond to treatment,” Maila said. The man's identity could not be revealed as his next of kin still had to be notified.

Maila confirmed that the hospital had already started with a thorough investigation into the matter. A patient left unattended is a “very serious matter” Maila said. Asked about the remarks made regarding the man’s nationality, Maila said he could not speak on behalf of the security guards.

“It is very irresponsible to talk like that. We must safeguard our patients, regardless. We must not take nationality into account,” Maila said.