“Ministry Of Health Neglected Our Son” – Family to Zimbabwe’s Journalist who Died of Coronavirus

The family to the first Zimbabwean who has died of coronavirus has accused the country’s Ministry of Heath and Child Care of neglecting their son, the late  Zororo Makamba.

The family said the ministry was ill prepared and failed to act decisively in the matter thus contributing to his death.

The grieving family broke their silence in an interview with The Daily News.

The family spokesperson, Tawanda Makamba, Elder brother to Zororo said, “The minister at some point suggested that we could take him to a trauma centre in Borrowdale. When it was now time for us to go to Borrowdale trauma they refused us to go there.”

“Instead they got the owner of Borrowdale Trauma Centre to call me and he told me that he could come and set up an ICU at Wilkins for Zororo complete with a ventilator and monitors, but he said that we had to pay US$120 000 for the equipment.

He revealed that the equipment would then be donated to Wilkins Hospital after Zororo was done using it.

So basically the hospital wanted us to buy the equipment for them. We don’t have US$120 000.”

“The hospital did not have any medication to help Zororo. We sourced a ventilator from a family friend.

The only medication available are the ones we bought from South Africa. We then bought the ventilators on Sunday 2pm, and when we got to Wilkins, the portable ventilator had an American plug.

They told us to get an adapter because they only had round sockets at the hospital. I then rushed to buy an adapter and came back but they never used it. I asked why and they said there are no plugs in the room.”

Zororo Makamba’s death left a lot of devastation in the country and most people have just begun to grapple the reality that is Coronavirus.