Teenager hitchhiking to the nearest clinic delivers her stillborn baby on the roadside
Villagers in the Eastern Cape town where Winnie Madikizela-Mandela was born often wait six hours for an ambulance
Residents in the Alfred Nzo District, say they often wait six hours for an ambulance. Photos: Nombulelo Damba-Hendrik
- An Eastern Cape teenager had a miscarriage while she was hitchhiking to the nearest clinic in Mbongweni, Bizana, about 20 km from her home.
- Residents who live in the same village where ANC stalwart Winnie Madikizela-Mandela was born, say they often wait six hours for an ambulance.
- The provincial health department has blamed the poor state of roads for the shortage of ambulances in the Alfred Nzo District.
- The department confirmed that eight of the 48 ambulances in the district are currently in working condition.
The Eastern Cape Department of Health has blamed the poor state of roads for the shortage of ambulances in the Alfred Nzo District.
This follows a recent incident where a 18-year-old had a miscarriage while she was hitchhiking to the nearest clinic – about 20 kilometres away.
Of the district’s 48 ambulances, only eight are in working condition. These serve about 102 wards and seven hospitals. This has meant that many patients in need of urgent care, particularly those in rural areas, have had to find their own way to the nearest clinic or hospital.
Department spokesperson Siyanda Manana told GroundUp that ambulances in this district had to contend with high volume callouts while “traversing extremely rough terrain” in rural communities.
As a result, he said, emergency vehicles frequently break down and need regular maintenance. This means that there are often fewer ambulances on the road to keep up with the high demand.
Mother’s struggle to reach clinic
On Saturday 1 February this reporter was a passenger in a car driving on the road to Mbongweni in Bizana when she saw four young women hitchhiking to the clinic in Mbongweni.
We stopped and gave the women a lift to the clinic. While in the car, they pointed out that one of them, a pregnant teenager, was feeling ill. She said she had relatives who live close to the Meje Community Health Centre – where she was headed.
Throughout the bumpy, pothole-ridden gravel road, the pregnant teen kept complaining of abdominal pain.
About 15 minutes into the drive, the she asked me to urgently stop the car so she could relieve herself. She jumped out in the cold and rainy weather, and ran to an open field with long overgrown bushes next to the road.
After a few minutes of waiting, I went to check on her and that’s when I saw that she was bleeding with the tiny, lifeless fetus still between her legs. She had not previously been for a checkup yet but she estimated that she was more than 20 weeks pregnant.
I called for help to pick the young woman up and carry her to the car. Another passerby indicated that it would be faster to get her to the clinic, 5km away, rather than phoning and waiting for an ambulance. I waited outside with the woman and tried to shield her from the rain with an umbrella, while the person driving the car I was in rushed to the clinic for help.
The driver returned about 40 minutes later with two of the three nurses who were on duty that day. The nurses jumped into action to help the mother. We waited another five minutes for the mobile clinic to arrive.
The teenager was taken to the clinic but was released a few hours later without any pain medication. Her mother told this reporter that she had to take her daughter to Oliver and Adelaide Tambo Hospital two days later for a checkup, but they had to return unassisted because hospital staff were on strike. Her mother said they had no choice but to take her to a private doctor.
The Meje Community Health Centre, opened in 2023, was meant to be a 24-hour emergency facility but is not operating this way due to budget constraints.
Lost hometown legacy
Mbongweni is the birthplace of ANC stalwart Winnie Madikizela Mandela. A few years ago, the government spent R223-million to build a new community health centre which was meant to operate as a 24-hour emergency facility.
Ward councillor Thulani Dlamini said it’s better to hire a car for R700 to get someone to hospital urgently rather than waiting six hours for an ambulance to arrive.
“When Meje CHC was opened in 2023, we were told it was going to be a 24-hour facility. This community health centre services about five wards, each with about 4,000 households. All we have been asking from the department is to have at least one ambulance stationed here so it can easily get to people. If a person is stabbed after 6pm the family is forced to hire a car to take the person to hospital because there are no ambulances,” he said.
But health department spokesman Siyanda Manana said that financial constraints coupled with historic medical legal claims have made it challenging to run the full service. The new facility is about 2km from Madikizela-Mandela’s family home.
He said ambulances were “strategically placed at a district call centre and at EMS bases”. He confirmed that the Meje health centre currently has three doctors, an operational manager nurse, eight professional nurses, four staff nurses and two nursing assistants.
SANRAL had promised, in 2021, to fix the road. It appointed an engineering firm in July 2022 for R113-million to design and supervise the project. But the contractor failed to meet its contractual obligations within the agreed timelines, according to SANRAL spokesperson Lwando Mahlasela.
Mahlasela said the matter is now being handled by SANRAL’s legal department. He said the process to appoint a new consulting firm will start thereafter.
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