South African Hospitals Forced to Turn Away COVID-19 Patients

By VOA News July 16, 2020

Some South African hospitals are turning away hundreds of people infected with the coronavirus because of a lack of medical staff and equipment, a doctor says.

Dr. Tobisa Fodo said her intensive care unit at a hospital in Port Elizabeth has been able to accept only a quarter of the people seeking treatment.

''It's heartbreaking in the sense that you end up yourself and your team having to say no to somebody's mother, somebody's grandmother, somebody's father, somebody's uncle," Fodo said. She said cores of people are dying in South Africa without getting medical treatment.

South Africa has confirmed more than 300,000 coronavirus cases and more than 4,400 deaths.