Peter -- Peter van Heusden <pvh at egenetics.com> NOTE: I do not speak for my employer, Electric Genetics "Criticism has torn up the imaginary flowers from the chain not so that man shall wear the unadorned, bleak chain but so that he will shake off the chain and pluck the living flower." - Karl Marx, 1844 ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Thu, 12 Oct 2000 09:29:37 +0200 From: Stephen <stephen at eda.org.za> To: Debate <debate at sunsite.wits.ac.za> Subject: DEBATE: Fw: Too poor to pay life-saving R51
> Too poor to pay life-saving R51
> Water scheme is beyond the means of poverty-stricken families, struck down
> by cholera after drinking from contaminated streams INGRID SALGADO
> AN IMPOVERISHED community in northern KwaZulu-Natal is being stricken with
> cholera because most households cannot afford the R51 fee that would give
> them access to a R14.9-million water scheme.
> Residents of rural areas around Ngwelezane, near Empangeni, continued to
> draw contaminated water from boreholes, springs and nearby rivers this
week
> as health authorities urged them to step up hygiene practices and treat
the
> polluted water with bleach.
> Only 700 households have joined the water scheme implemented by the
> Mhlathuze Water Board, while a further 2 000 families are unconnected.
> The scheme, designed to give people access to water within 200m of their
> homes, became operational shortly before the epidemic broke out in August.
> The board's acting chief executive, James Barnard, said: "People will
> gladly pay R7 for a two-litre Coke, but complain bitterly when they must
> pay the same price for more than 1 000 litres of water."
> The board has agreed temporarily to waive the R51 registration fee and, on
> Thursday, began handing out free water tokens to the community.
> The death toll in and around Ngwelezane rose to 13 this week, while
another
> four people succumbed to cholera in Eshowe, about 40km away. More than 1
> 000 cholera cases have been identified in both areas.
> Provincial Health MEC Dr Zweli Mkhize has warned that time is running out
> for the authorities to combat the deadly waterborne disease.
> "We want to turn the tide around before the rains come. We've got only a
> couple of weeks to reverse the outbreak," he said.
> Health officials have shifted into emergency gear, setting up rehydration
> points in the worst-affected areas and distributing free bleach to poor
> households.
> The defence force has been called in to distribute water from tankers to
> areas where no piped water is available.
> At the Zungu homestead in Sigisi, just outside Ngwelezane, the measures
> came too late. The family's matriarch, Octavia Zungu, 65, died of
> cholerainduced dehydration last Wednesday, while her husband, son and five
> grandchildren are recovering from the illness.
> "We are really in crisis. My mother was the sole breadwinner with her
> pension," said Bhekisisa Zungu, 36.
> His sister, Makhosi, 23, said the family drank water from the Mhlathuze
> River as they could not afford to pay for water.
> "Many families around here don't have the registration card," she said.
> Dr Ken Wanguhu, superintendent of Ngwelezane Hospital, said most people
> could not afford the water scheme.
> "They do not consider water to be a priority when there's a nearby stream.
> My concern is that providing clean water now is only a short-term
solution.
> We need to consider the long term," he said.
> This week, a startling picture emerged of the sequence of events that led
> up to the outbreak around Ngwelezane.
> Authorities discovered that some areas were still receiving free water in
> terms of a 17-year initiative of the former KwaZulu government to deal
with
> the 1983/4 drought.
> "It was eventually noticed, and it was decided to switch off the supply,"
> said the chief executive of the Uthungulu Regional Council, B B Biyela.
> "The people were given sufficient warning and the supply was cut off at
the
> beginning of August."
> The first cases indicating cholera were noticed in Matshana and Nqutshini
> In the second week of August. The first case confirmed was on August 19.
> At this point, health officials asked the Mhlathuze Water Board to
> reconnect the free water supplied by the former homeland government to the
> Nqutshini area.
> The number of cholera cases in Nqutshini dropped from 65 in August to 40
> last month .
> But, in nearby Matshana, the incidence of cholera almost doubled to 148
> cases in September. In Sigisi, they leapt from 40 in August to 144 in
> September.
> Health authorities have not yet been able to pinpoint the source of the
> bacteria but suspect the Mhlathuze River, from which the first positive
> cholera samples were identified on Friday.
> The disease could have been passed on to Eshowe via the Mlalazi River,
> person-to-person contact or contamination of the underground water source.
> Meanwhile, the Mhlathuze Water Board has accused authorities of failing to
> conduct a well-coordinated disaster campaign. "One does not really want to
> blame the Department of Health, but they have not used the available
> resources to conduct tests of the water. They have not shared what they're
> doing," said Barnard.
> "It's the old problem of too many role players that don't talk to one
> another. And so it becomes a crisis, which it should never have been."
> The chief environmental health officer for the affected areas, Vusi Ntuli,
> said a meeting would be held tomorrow at which a common strategy would be
> discussed by traditional leaders and officials from the national
department
> of water affairs, the national and provincial departments of health, local
> government and the defence force.