South Africa ( Common Wealth) _ Many of the people of Hammanskraal, which is close to Pretoria, the capital of South Africa, who were waiting in line for free bottles of clean water and soap, were not surprised when a cholera outbreak there was reported.
A 51-year-old woman named Joyce Tshweau braved the long queue to get clean water that was intended to help stop an epidemic that has already claimed 21 lives. “If you drink the (tap) water, your stomach is running,” she added.
In Hammanskraal, a substandard neighborhood in South Africa with a population of roughly 120,000, clean water and sanitation have always been a problem.
It is unknown how the outbreak got started or whether the contaminated water in Hammanskraal has anything to do with it. The cause of the outbreak is being looked at by the authorities. Instead of the capital of Africa’s most industrialized nation, cholera is more commonly linked to the continent’s least developed nations.
However, it has brought attention to service delivery issues that are of particular concern before national elections in 2024, which are anticipated to be the most challenging for the African National Congress (ANC) since it came to power in 1994 at the end of white minority rule.
The municipality failed to operate a nearby water treatment facility, according to Tumelo Koitheng, 52, the chair of the Hammanskraal Residents Forum, and raw sewage began leaking into the water supply.
The Democratic Alliance took control the municipality in 2016, after it had been run by the ANC, but people claim that the water quality hasn’t changed.
Koitheng stated that because water tanker trips were sporadic, locals were compelled to purchase bottled water. “The water had a greenish color and you could smell feces,” he added.
An inquiry for comment was not immediately answered by the national department of health. According to David Mahlobo, the deputy water and sewage minister of South Africa, the wastewater treatment facilities in the area of Pretoria have not been properly maintained.
The fact that we are still treating disease outbreaks from the Middle Ages is a sad state of affairs. According to Jo Barnes, senior lecturer emeritus at the University of Stellenbosch’s college of medicine and health sciences, SA has the richest economy on the entire African continent.
