Transport and Public Works
According to the procurement reports issued from April to September 2020, the following payments have been made for accommodation and other services:
- Lagoon Beach Hotel: R64 684 378,25; (b) Houwhoek Hotel: R5 193 900,00; (c) Bidvest Properties: R3 263 759,16; (d) CTICC: R44 771 904,21; (e) Muster Property Services: R13 437 582,44; (f) Protea Hotel, Durbanville: R2 488 435,75; and (g) Reeds Country Lodge: R1 275 710,00:
- whether each of the facilities listed above had the necessary accreditation to handle or dispose of medical waste; if so, what are the relevant details;
- who was accommodated at each of the facilities listed above over the period April to September 2020;
- what happened to the equipment procured for use at each of the facilities listed above;
- whether each of the facilities listed above provided the various departments with full reports on how the funding was spent; if so, can copies of these reports be made available?
The service provider responsible for handling and disposal of medical waste has the required accreditation. The Department of Health has a contract in place with an accredited Medical Waste Service
Provide for handling and disposal of medical waste generated at Bidvest Properties [Brackengate Hospital of Hope] and CTICC Hospital of Hope. Medical Waste Technical Support is provided by both Departments of Health and the Department of Environmental Affairs and Development Planning to Quarantine and Isolation Facilities at Lagoon Beach Hotel, Houw Hoek Hotel, Protea Hotel and Reeds Country Lodge and the sites managed by Muster Property Services to ensure the handling and disposal of medical waste is done via an accredited service provider and in line with legislative requirements.
(2) Patient details fall within the ambit of the Department of Health and this question should therefore be directed to Minister of Health.
(3) Cape Town International Convention Centre (CTICC):
After the decommissioning the facility, details of the equipment were compiled and distributed by the Department of Health to the services which have indicated their needs in this regard. The equipment mainly comprising beds, overbed tables, bedside cabinets and vital signs monitors were distributed across the services. A small contingency of equipment was stored for projects with the intent to save on project cost in the immediate future. The Department of Health would be in a position to provide more details in this regard, if required
Brackengate (Bidvest Properties):
This facility is in use and all equipment remains on-site.
The security hut procured for Groot Drakenstein Cultural Facility was transferred to a provincially owned facility and the open view decoder to PetroSA Q&I Facility.
(4) When quarantine and isolation facilities were catered for, part of the consideration was that government should leverage its spend by investing in the local economy specifically, in this instance, the hospitality industry which was in hard lockdown at the time in an effort to prevent job losses. Quarantine and isolation facilities were procured by obtaining detailed quotations from hospitality establishments identified through either tourism offices in the towns where a need for such facilities arose and/or contacting the facilities identified by the Health officials within the specific COVID-19 affected district. These establishments were contacted either telephonically or by e-mail to ascertain if there was any interest in becoming a Covid-19 facility. In many cases, the owners advised that they were not interested in becoming a facility either because of owner comorbidities or because of the unavailability of staff or fear of pandemic. Due to the urgent need with which the accommodation of persons under investigation or positive cases had to be dealt with, the focus was predominantly on the procurement of establishments offering turnkey solutions. These establishments had to be immediately available, needed no adjustment to the infrastructure (minimizing or eliminating sunken costs) and were also compliant with the guidelines for Q&I issued by the National Department of Health. Those compliant establishments that indicated interest were requested to submit quotations, which were evaluated in terms of the FEDHASA rates, used as a guide by National Treasury. If found to be compliant with these rates, purchase orders were issued to these establishments. Payments to the quarantine and isolation facilities were invoice based.
