In the eight years since the Gauteng health department ended its contract with a private psychiatric hospital group, Life Esidimeni, to look after long-term state mental health patients, a tragedy of 144 people dying and 44 going missing at the hands of “an admittedly delinquent provincial government” has unfolded.
The former Gauteng health MEC says it wasn’t her job to visit organisations prior to transferring state patients into their care.
Laura Lopez Gonzalez is a freelance health journalist and editor. She was Bhekisisa's news editor, then deputy editor between 2016 and 2020.
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