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A raid by health officials and law enforcement officers has closed down a “hospital of horrors” in the city centre.
Shocking find: the executive director for the City's health department Dr Refik Bismilla at the scene of the raid
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HAT started as a routine duty to rid the city of posters pasted and tied on to walls and street poles by “doctors” advertising their services, led Johannesburg metro police and health officials to illegal abortion centres that were contravening almost every City health by-law in the book.
On Friday, 11 January, members of the Johannesburg metro police department (JMPD), the South African Police Service (SAPS), and health officials from the City and the province raided a building in central Johannesburg after calling one of the “doctors” and pretending to be potential clients. What they found has been described as a “hospital of horrors”.
An assortment of medical equipment used to perform abortions and drugs were found in extremely unhygienic rooms that had been converted into illegal surgeries. The floors were blood-spattered and a number of used condoms and gloves, some with blood still on them, were found.
The building itself was in extremely poor condition, with handmade partitioning used to divide the rooms, a hazard if a fire was to break out.
Arrests
Some 11 people were arrested for operating these illegal establishments, but some people managed to escape, according to City spokesperson Nthatisi Modingoane.
“Those arrested were charged with contravening national health regulations and … City of Johannesburg public health by-laws. The police are continuing with investigations and there might be additional charges.”
The “doctors” operating the surgeries were found not to have any proof of registration as medical practitioners or nurses. They also could not show proof that they had been licensed by the Gauteng health department to carry out terminations of pregnancy (TOP).
Sikhonjiwe Masilela, the director in the provincial health department, says there are many centres operating illegally in Johannesburg. However, their number cannot be determined because many of them operated clandestinely.
“As the licensing people, we are faced with the challenge of people setting up medical centres without approval from the health department. Most of the people who set up these centres have existing medical centres and when they expand and open a new centre under the same name, they don’t bother to apply for an operating licence from the department.”
Licence application
For a practitioner to open up a medical centre for terminations, he or she must apply through the provincial health department’s maternal, child and women’s health and nutrition unit, the body that grants operating licences for abortion institutions in the province.
The applicant has to go through a specific procedure to be granted an operating licence and has to meet certain criteria before any health official can visit the proposed centre for approval, according to Masilela. “These centres must also meet occupational health and safety standards.”
He advises people who want to set up health centres to contact the City of Johannesburg’s health department first.
“The local authority has its zones. There are residential zones, business zones etc and an applicant would have to get approval from the department of urban management to set up a practice in a certain location within the city. Approval should also be obtained from an environmental officer. We also need a copy of the plan of the building where the medical centre would be operating from.”
Without approval from these departments, the province will not issue a licence to the applicant, adds Masilela.
Health inspection
“The TOP centres that were raided obviously did not have any operating licences and were not registered, otherwise our health inspection officers, who frequently conduct inspections of health centres, would have closed them a long time ago.”
Masilela puts part of the blame for the popularity of illegal abortion centres on newspapers that accept notices advertising TOP services without checking their legitimacy. “If newspapers could verify these notices, we would go a long way in eradicating these illegal centres.”
The raid blew the whistle on unscrupulous people bent on making money at whatever cost and the City has taken a step to nip these illicit businesses in the bud. Modingoane says Joburg is working closely with other spheres of government to improve conditions in the inner city.
“A number of joint operations by the City, SAPS, Home Affairs and other government departments are conducted on an ongoing basis.”
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