Limpopo Premier Phophi Ramathuba and Health MEC Dieketseng Mashego have welcomed a South African patient who could not receive a required medical treatment at a hospital in Bulawayo, Zimbabwe, on Monday, 29 April 2025.
According to reports, the patient fell ill and collapsed while doing business-related exhibitions in Zimbabwe on Sunday, 28 April and was then taken to one of the hospitals in Bulawayo.
Ramathuba said the provincial government received a call from Zimbabwe’s hospital requesting an intervention on a SA citizen who fell ill while on work purpose, saying they couldn’t give him a complete medical treatment due to logistical reasons.
The premier said they made arrangements to airlift the patient from Beitbridge Border Post in Musina to the Pietersburg Provincial Hospital.
“After we received a communication that they can’t help him, because he might need blood diffusion and diagnosis, we tried to get medical transport vehicles to Beitbridge, although we were confronted with logistical difficulties.
“He had been brought to the border by a private ambulance paid for by the provincial Health Department as the Zimbabwean Government could not assist,” Ramathuba said, when receiving the patient at the Limpopo provincial hospital.
The premier further thanked the Limpopo Department of Health’s staff for attending to the situation when called, even when they were not on duty.
In 2022, during her tenure as Health MEC, Ramathuba faced a backlash for chastising an undocumented Zimbabwean, who was waiting for surgery at a government hospital in Bela-Bela in Limpopo.
Ramathuba accused the patient of ‘killing her health system’, adding that the government of Zimbabwe was not giving her department money to operate her.
Ramathuba’s then viral rant on the Zimbabwean patient, was reported to the Health Profession Council of South Africa (HPCSA), and the matter is currently before court.
She argued that the HPCSA did not have jurisdiction on the matter, and the conversation between her and the patient did not constitute any form of unprofessional conduct and was relevant to her work as a political head of the provincial Department of Health.
