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As it battles Africa’s largest COVID-19 outbreak, South Africa is receiving help from the United States in the form of more than 1,000 ventilators and other medical equipment.
U.S. Ambassador to South Africa Lana Marks presented the second shipment of 50 U.S.-made ventilators on July 5 at Chris Hani Baragwanath Hospital in Soweto. The U.S. sent 20 ventilators in May. The U.S., through the U.S. Agency for International Development, has pledged to provide South Africa with 1,000 ventilators to supplement its own supplies as COVID-19 infections continue to increase.
In early July, South Africa reported more than 200,000 cases of COVID-19. High rates of HIV, tuberculosis and other chronic diseases put much of the country’s population at elevated risk for the potentially fatal respiratory disease.
“We are still facing the storm,” Health Minister Zweli Mkhize told local media after receiving the first round of U.S. ventilators.
In April, the government announced the National Ventilator Project with a goal of building 10,000 ventilators by the end of June. That number was later increased to 20,000 by August to meet surging demand. The country last produced ventilators almost two decades ago, Economic Development Minister Ebrahim Patel told Cape Business News in May.
South Africa eased its nationwide lockdown on June 1. At the time, the country reported 34,357 COVID-19 infections. By July 1, COVID-19 cases had more than quadrupled. On July 7, the country reported nearly 224,000 infections, according to the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention. The amount of cases is the most of any country in Africa and nearly 44% of the cases continent-wide.
Although the Western Cape province was an early epicenter of infections, Gauteng province surrounding Johannesburg and Soweto recently has seen a surge.
The U.S.-made ventilators will be distributed to intensive care units across the country, Ambassador Marks said. Nationwide, South Africa has 3,300 ICU beds between public and private hospitals. As the pandemic reached South Africa earlier this year, the country had an estimated 4,000 ventilators.
Some of the U.S.-made ventilators are likely to stay at Chris Hani Baragwanath Hospital, which, with 3,000 beds and plans to add 500 more, is the largest public hospital in the Southern Hemisphere, Gauteng Premier David Makhura said.
The donated ventilators bring to more than $41 million the U.S. contribution to helping South Africa fight the spread of COVID-19, according to the embassy. Other donations have included personal protective gear such as face masks and training for 10,000 critical-care doctors and nurses who will use the ventilators.
Dr. Bandile Masuku, a member of the Executive Committee for Health in Gauteng, was part of the delegation receiving the latest round of ventilators. They will go a long way toward helping South Africa conquer COVID-19, Masuku said.
“We are faced with a very difficult, mammoth task of fighting the pandemic, which is described as the invisible enemy,” Masuku said. “But this is one of the tasks that as humanity we have to achieve. We have to unite and work with strength to make sure we defeat the pandemic.”
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