Everyday screening at Correctional Services
Those who were transferred were quarantined for 14 days before being taken to cells, to ensure minimum spread of the virus.
The Correctional Services Department has made advances in ensuring the safety of inmates and officials at both prisons in Vryheid and Ncome by conducting Covid-19 screenings every day.
Vryheid prison has a capacity of 440 prisoners, including those who have been sentenced. This while Ncome Medium B has 1000 sentenced inmates and Medium A 900 inmates, both sentenced and those awaiting trial.
Correctional Services staff screen all the inmates, officials, as well as transfers every day. Those who were transferred were quarantined for 14 days before being taken to cells, to ensure minimum spread of the virus.
According to Correctional Services, there were a few suspected cases and they liaised with the Department of Health (DoH). Those suspected of having Covid-19 were then tested and found to be clear of the virus. The prisons do not conduct tests, only the DoH.
Correctional Services has also requested the DoH to conduct mass screenings in all three facilities. The screening will include the officials’ families that live in these facilities.
Also read: eMondlo: First at mass Covid-19 screening
Meanwhile, during the Joint Operations Committee (JOC) on Covid-19 meeting, it emerged that AbaQulusi did not have any by-laws on businesses found to be selling expired goods. It was agreed that the municipality needed to put these in place and present a plan to the JOC at the next meeting.
Furthermore, the DoH and Department of Labour were tasked to work with shop owners on the use of thermometers to ensure that these were SABS approved and should have ‘calibrated’ certificates.
Shop owners were urged to refer people to their nearest health facilities should they find themselves with symptoms of the virus, instead of sending them back home where they might infect more people.
Citizens of AbaQulusi were encouraged not to share face masks, as that may cause a rapid spread of the coronavirus, and people were urged to wash their face masks every day as a way of trying to combat further infections.
According to the DoH, there were still no positive cases in AbaQulusi following the two recoveries a couple of weeks ago.
Vryheid District Hospital CEO Fikile Ngema indicated that the hospital did not have rapid-test kits as yet, therefore rendering it impossible to test everyone at once.
“Everyone will be screened, but we will only test a person who meets the criteria. So far, we have done 6734 household screenings and 6012 at clinics. The total number of screened people is at 23,607 so far. Screening in eMondlo has been completed; we are working with the ACE Foundation, which will assist with screenings in town, mining areas and other areas.
“We currently have five suspected cases; four from the clinics and one from the hospital. Suspected cases are quarantined for 14 days. People who are suspected to be positive are put in isolation at their homes after health officials have assessed their living conditions. Should their living conditions not be in a good state, they are then isolated in hospital. When isolated at home, health officials do daily visits until the 14-day period is over and then conduct tests to see whether they are positive or negative,” said Ngema.
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