Gauteng’s disaster management clinicians outline World Cup shortfalls

Abstract

A lack of standardised disaster management protocols, poor inter-communication between health care authorities and emergency rescue services and shaky environmental health and port health controls threaten Gauteng’s risk preparedness for the 2010 World Cup.

This emerged from interviews with the top clinicians responsible for disaster management at Charlotte Maxeke Johannesburg Academic, Chris Hani Baragwanath and Helen Joseph hospitals last month.

While making herculean efforts to ensure they are as prepared as possible by June, the hands-on managers admitted that it would take ‘some stepping up’ to handle a ‘surge’ beyond their current near-peak capacity operations on any difficult weekend.

Depending on which public hospital Izindaba spoke to, the challenges came down to shortages of clinical and support staff, equipment, and ICU and trauma nursing skills, and budget shortfalls.