When patients started dying at NGOs after being moved from Life Esidimeni facilities, the Gauteng mental health directorate implemented an 'adopt an NGO' strategy to save lives.
The former head of Gauteng Mental Health, Makgabo Manamela, has told the Life Esidimeni inquest that ‘even qualified people like psychiatrists did not raise concerns in the meetings. They were scared to speak.’
The Life Esidimeni inquest stands as a crucial accountability process for a national tragedy that ought never to have happened and should never happen again. Here, they summarise and assess progress at the inquest since October last year. They previously wrote about the first months of the inqu.
The Life Esidimeni Inquest stands as a crucial accountability process for a national tragedy that ought never to have happened and should never happen again, write Julia Chaskalson and Mbali Baduza.