The South Africans who are being forced to stay under quarantine in the Coastlands Hotel in Durban for 14 days must be released and provided with the relevant documentation to self-isolate at home. The facility does not comply with the prescribed health and safety standards in terms of the guidelines for quarantine facilities that were issued by the Department of Health on 3 May 2020.
This past Wednesday, 3 June 2020, the FF Plus received complaints from people who were on the Carnival Fascination cruise ship that docked in Durban. These people worked on the ship. According to sources, they were initially told that they would be kept under quarantine at the City Lodge Hotel, but when they arrived at the harbour, they were alphabetically divided into groups and one group ended up at the Coastlands Hotel.
These people had to wait outside on the street for hours before they were allowed to enter the Hotel and it soon became apparent that the Hotel was not ready to serve as a quarantine facility.
Staff members allegedly told them that the Hotel does not comply with quarantine requirements and that they could come and go as they please. There are no medical staff nor any medical stations available at the Hotel. There was no doctor available on the premises and the people were allowed to go to the shops to buy food.
The rooms were dirty, had not been sanitised and security is inadequate. The group was only provided with a little tea and coffee for the upcoming 14 days.
The FF Plus immediately brought the matter to the attention of the Department of Health and the office of the Minister of Health and insisted that these people must be tested as soon as possible so that they can get their results and be released to go home.
The FF Plus also requested that a doctor and nurses must be sent to the Hotel at once and that arrangements must be made for private testing to be done. Private testing was indeed conducted yesterday afternoon, Thursday, 4 June.
The FF Plus remains in contact with the government to resolve the matter as soon as possible. The reason why half of the group was taken to the City Lodge Hotel and the other half to the inadequate Coastlands Hotel in Durban’s CBD remains unclear.
The FF Plus suspects that there may be irregularities related to the use of the Hotel and will request further clarification of how the tender was awarded to the Hotel, who inspected the facility, when the inspection was done and who signed off on it.
If the Hotel’s tender is part of the R28 million that Minister Patricia de Lille’s Department of Public Works paid to private institutions to accommodate people under quarantine, then this comes down to nothing but the blatant theft of taxpayers’ money.
The problems experienced with the quarantine facilities where people, who travelled from neighbouring countries or abroad, are accommodated must be resolved at once. People must be allowed to self-isolate or self-quarantine after being adequately screened at border posts.
After that, everyone can be monitored by means of their cell phones. Not only is taxpayers’ money being squandered and stolen, but law-abiding citizens are also being treated as criminals and in the process their human rights are violated.
Read the original article in Afrikaans by Philip van Staden on FF Plus
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