THE prisoner who allegedly died of Covid-19 has created fear at Sun City Prison in Joburg.
The removal of the body from the premises was caught on video, which did the social media rounds.
According to sources, this was the first inmate at the prison to die of the virus.
"It’s time we fight for our lives or we will all die,” said a source.
Another source said: “Records and case management committees offices are closed. The prison clinic no longer works because two nurses tested positive, and others aren’t going to work in fear of Covid 19. More than 20 prison officials have tested positive.”
But correctional services spokesman Singabakho Nxumalo said irrespective of what the cause of death was, taking a video of a body being removed was distasteful. “We have not seen the video and will not even be interested to watch it, except to call upon people to afford respect and dignity to others, especially their families,” said Nxumalo.
He said they were taking precautions to fight the spread of virus throughout their facilities.
“When a person has tested positive, the first thing we do is initiate tracing of direct contacts. We have registers who also assist in identifying the officials and where they were deployed,” said Nxumalo.
“Those people are then placed in quarantine and must be tested for Covid-19. This is happening across all centres where cases have been confirmed, including Joburg. We remain transparent in measures we’ve deployed, hence the recovery rate of above 70%. Sadly, we’ve also had deaths.”
