Gauteng’s Nasrec Field Hospital gets first patients after life-saving donations

Doctors and activists sent out an urgent appeal on Friday, revealing that Gauteng’s Nasrec Field Hospital needs access to oxygen.

Addressing an acute shortage of intermediate care beds as Gauteng is hit by a surge of coronavirus infections, a group of volunteers and a number of generous donors have managed to create a small intermediate care facility where patients needing oxygen can receive medical care despite hospitals being full.

“We have had an amazing response from the public and from Daily Maverick (and Maverick Citizen) readers. By Saturday we had 70 oxygen concentrators on the ground at the Nasrec Intermediate Care field hospital. Two donors paid for us to buy 20 oxygen concentrators and other donor funds helped us to rent 50 more,” said Lynne Wilkinson, who is part of the volunteer initiative. They first raised the alarm on Friday that more provision had to be made for patients needing oxygen – but at the time it was very difficult to find oxygen concentrators in the province as people had stockpiled them in case they might need them.

“Air Liquide and their South African counterpart Vital Air made the reduced cost of rental possible and delivered within 24 hours of us making contact. We are unbelievably appreciative,” she said.

“We spent the weekend managing the arrival of the concentrators, orienting and training volunteer staff and getting ourselves organised to receive intermediate care patients who are stable from the big public sector hospitals, but still need oxygen to free up higher care beds. Our first five patients are arriving this afternoon (Monday) from Helen Joseph Hospital with volunteer doctors and nurses ready to receive them,” she said.

Gauteng is now the epicentre of the Covid-19 pandemic with about 5,000 new cases a day and close to 100,000 cases of people testing positive for the coronavirus. The province is experiencing a public hospital crisis as all state hospitals have reached capacity and there is an urgent need to assist patients with oxygen.

Oxygen concentrators filter surrounding air, compress it to the required density, and then deliver purified medical-grade oxygen to the patient. The machines cost R16,000 each, but as they use air and not bottled oxygen there is no need to purchase oxygen cylinders.

The Nasrec Field Hospital on Friday had only 450 low acuity beds for patients who are self-caring and do not require oxygen. But the provincial government indicated that they were in the process of expanding the field hospital by a further 800 beds and said more staff had been commissioned.

Minister of Health Dr Zweli Mkhize also mentioned in his briefing on Monday 13 June that there was a concerted effort to recruit nurses through agencies and open calls for Gauteng to assist with the rapidly increasing number of cases in that province. He indicated that the first cohort of newly recruited nurses was allocated to hospitals on Monday.