A video has appeared on popular web-content sharing platform YouTube recently showing sewage running through the ceiling of a children’s clinic at the Charlotte Maxeke Johannesburg Hospital.

According to a statement published by opposition party the Democratic Alliance’s spokesperson, Jack Bloom, “Staff and patients at the Charlotte Maxeke Johannesburg Hospital have been disturbed several times in the past few weeks by leaks of smelly water from the ceiling at various parts of the hospital.”

After visiting the hospital on 21 October this year, Bloom, who is the Gauteng Shadow Health MEC told press he had found “flattened cardboard boxes used to absorb liquid at the fourth level car park near the oncology department.” He added that staff told him the leak had been there for a week, with sewage also spilling into the cancer patients’ waiting area.

The problem is widely known about within the hospital and has reached the stage that surgeries are now regularly rescheduled to move to different blocks within the hospital to get away from unhygienic and bad smelling leaks.

A lack of routine maintenance appears to be at the heart of the problem, although this is not due to there being a lack of funds.

“The problem is poor planning not a lack of budget as the Gauteng Health Department failed to spend R538.5 million for capital projects last year,” Bloom said in his press statement.

There are further reports of similar sewage problem at the Chris Hani Baragwaneth Hospital, where smelly sewage is running next to Medical Admissions Ward 20.

Watch the Charlotte Maxeke video here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=npZe3qGpeqA&feature=youtube_gdata