SATURDAY’s power outage at the Windhoek Central Hospital did not only claim at least two lives, premature babies in incubators were also at risk.
Besides the two fatalities, three other critically ill patients were rushed to the Rhino Park Hospital from the Intensive Care Unit (ICU).These three patients rely on ventilators to stay alive.Chaos erupted at the State hospital on Saturday when a power cut blacked out the hospital’s west wing. The hospital’s emergency generator cannot cover all buildings on the premises.One mother with a premature baby lashed out at the hospital yesterday saying: ‘I want to know how something like that happens. Why doesn’t the ministry have precautions for these types of occurrences?’ She said the oxygen in the incubators where her baby is being treated ‘kept on going off’ on Saturday. ‘These babies need constant heat in order for them to survive. She is doing well, thank the Lord, but Saturday’s occurrence could have had negative consequences.’ The Ministry of Health and Social Services has refused to come clean about the scope of Saturday’s disaster.Dr Rheinhardt Gariseb, who was in charge of the hospital until 07h00 yesterday morning, yesterday maintained that he had no knowledge of any fatalities.Windhoek Central’s senior medical superintendent, Dr Sarah Shalongo, refused to comment and said Minister Richard Kamwi should be contacted.Kamwi referred The Namibian to the permanent secretary, Kahijoro Kahuure, because ‘it is purely administrative’.Kahuure confirmed via SMS that there were fatalities, without providing any further details.On Sunday Gariseb put the blame for the power failure on the City of Windhoek. ‘It is a problem of the municipality. The power supply was affected and the relevant people informed.’Yesterday, the City’s spokesperson, Liz Sibindi, distanced the municipality from the incident. She said: ‘The fault was not at the side of the City. It’s a cable problem which the hospital had.’
