Question NW3235 to the Minister of Health

Reply:

a) (i) Hospitals

All public hospitals have backup generators. Backup generators are only meant to run as backup for 2 to 3 hours for life saving equipment in emergency areas. Service delivery therefore gets negatively affected in areas which are not powered by generators.

(ii) Clinics and Community Health Centres (CHCS)

Backup power in the form of generators is available in 42% of clinics and 86% of CHCs nation-wide.

• Impact of load shedding on PHC facilities that do not have backup power.
• The electronic Health Patient Record System works on electrical power and during power failures staff cannot retrieve patients files and patients have to wait until power is on thus increasing patient waiting times
• Patients physical examination and deliveries becomes impossible in dark consulting rooms resulting in unnecessary referrals of patients to hospitals.
• Water interruption due to the water pumps in reservoirs requiring electricity to function.
• Telecommunication break down affecting receiving calls from communities and contacting call centre for ambulance.

(b) Provinces that are affected the most:

Clinics: The Table below indicates that only Gauteng and KwaZulu-Natal have more than 70% coverage with regard to backup power in clinics.

District	Total number of clinics	Facilities have backup electricity	Average % scored
ec Eastern Cape Province	723	145	20%
fs Free State Province	202	32	16%
gp Gauteng Province	326	267	82%
kz KwaZulu-Natal Province	580	418	72%
lp Limpopo Province	452	113	25%
mp Mpumalanga Province	226	88	39%
nc Northern Cape Province	124	24	19%
nw North West Province	259	80	31%
wc Western Cape Province	175	88	50%
Average / Total	3067	1288	42%

• 1288 out of 3067 Clinics has backup electricity
• 1779 clinics do not have backup electricity

Community Health Centres: The Table below indicates that only Free State Province (36%) has less than 70% coverage with regard to backup power in community Health Centres.

District	Total number of CHCs	Facilities having backup electricity	Average % scored
ec Eastern Cape Province	41	34	82%
fs Free State Province	10	4	36%
gp Gauteng Province	38	34	90%
kz KwaZulu-Natal Province	21	20	94%
lp Limpopo Province	26	20	77%
mp Mpumalanga Province	55	48	88%
nc Northern Cape Province	30	26	85%
nw North West Province	47	43	92%
wc Western Cape Province	48	42	87%
Average / Total	316	272	86%

• 272 out of 316 CHCs has backup electricity
• 44 CHCs do not have backup electricity

END.