MyPE

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Closure of frail care centres is a potential social crisis

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Dear MyPE

On 24 November Bobby Stevenson, Shadow MEC for Finance and constituency leader for PE south-west, and I visited the Algoa Frail Care Centre and the Lorraine Frail Care Centre and witnessed how profoundly disabled the patients are.

These individuals require highly specialised care from specialised people and need full-time attention. They also need specific infrastructure and equipment that is available in these homes.

It is quite clear from our interaction at these centres that there is no plan from the department of social development to deal with the situation going forward.

The DA is totally appalled that our elderly and frail can be treated in such a heartless fashion and we will be using every avenue available to the provincial legislature to fight for their plight.

I call on the MEC for Social Development, Nancy Sihlwayi, to lift the veil of secrecy and spell out why these centres are being closed and what the process is going forward. People in need of these facilities simply cannot be dumped on families and other institutions that are not capacitated and resourced to deal with them.

We are facing a massive potential social crisis in a similar manner as what happened in Gauteng recently, where patients had died.

A caring DA-government would never have dealt with this matter in such an inhumane and haphazard manner.

Regards

Kobus Botha, MPL

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Port Elizabethan

This author is a 'catch-all' for occasional articles and letters written to MyPE. The Author of each article can be found in the signature at the bottom of each individual article.