Lack of essential medicine, medical equipment, poor management and understaffing continue to plague the Mutale health centre in Tshilamba.
It is believed that the centre which was built in 1984 and never renovated to date, has sufficient equipment but is dysfunctional due to neglect by the Department of Health in Limpopo.
According to an inside source, the health centre’s maternity ward has been dysfunctional for many years after it was destroyed by a storm back in 2013.
The maternity ward’s roof was getting renovated but the construction company that was contracted abandoned the project and the roof now leaks whenever it rains.
The Mutale Health Centre is a convenient place which is meant to provide health services to hundreds of villagers across Mutale.
According to the source, the shortage of water is also one of the challenges plaguing the Mutale Health Centre. The source explained how a pregnant woman from Shakadza village couldn’t be assisted to give birth due to shortage of water and ended up giving birth while on her way to Donald Frazer Hospital. “Sometimes centre goes for a week without water.”
The source further adds that the centre has a laboratory, but they have never seen it working.
Management at the centre have allegedly written several memorandums of concern to the Department of Health in the Vhembe District which went unanswered.
Meanwhile, Health MEC spokesperson Thabiso Teffo, says while they were not aware of these challenges, the department will intervene and investigate the matter.
