THE Humansdorp Hospital has been shut down since Saturday after 35 staff members tested positive for Covid-19.
And Motherwell Care Centre in Port Elizabeth has been shut down since the beginning of the month.
The office of the Eastern Cape Premier Oscar Mabuyane released the province’s coronavirus statistics.
The premier’s spokesman, Mvusiwekhaya Sicwetsha, said: “As of 21 June, there were 15 751 people infected by the coronavirus in the province. Out of this number, 8 035 people had recovered from the infection, with 285 people sadly losing their lives.
“There are 763 healthcare workers employed by both private and public sector that were infected by the virus. Sadly, we lost 24 of our healthcare workers.”
Denosa’s provincial secretary Khaya Sodidi said: “We have 30 nurses, three doctors and two cleaners who have tested positive for Covid-19 at Humansdorp Hospital. At Motherwell Care Centre we have 15 nurses.
“This clearly shows we will have an explosion of Covid-19 cases, both from the communities and health staff, once the backlog of 15 000 results has been cleared.”
Provincial health spokesman Sizwe Kupelo confirmed the closure of the hospital.
He said: “We can confirm the positive cases that are affecting the hospital staff, including those of a cleaning company working at the hospital.
“We are now looking into the situation. The risk analysis and deep cleaning has been done, and decontamination is underway. We are continuing to assess the situation and our priority is to give support to all those affected by the virus.
“There are meetings that are currently taking place with Kouga Municipality in making sure everything gets back to normal,” Kupelo said.
Municipal spokeswoman Laura-Leigh Randall said: “The municipality helped with the decontamination of the hospital.”