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Bushbuckridge is a rural district of the Ehlanzeni District Municipality of the Mpumalanga province (previously known as the Eastern Transvaal), in South Africa. The Bushbuckridge area was given its name in the 1880’s as the area was a habitat for many herds of bushbuck.

The Coronavirus Disease 2019’ (COVID-19) which had its first outbreak in the Wuhan City of China towards the end of 2019, was declared a public health emergency or outbreak by World Health Organisation (WHO). The Bushbuckridge area was not spared the pandemic, much like any other corner of the Mpumalanga province and South Africa as a whole. Consequently, the residents of Bushbuckridge experienced varying effects and impacts of the pandemic which ultimately affected their social, economic, health, environmental, and technological well-being. Like anywhere else, the community of Bushbuckridge was also forced to adapt their lifestyle to living with the pandemic, owing to the prevalence thereof and the continually increasing cases.

The first case of COVID-19 case in South Africa was confirmed on the 5th March 2020, by the South African National Institute of Communicable Diseases (NICD) for a patient that had traveled to Italy. It was not until 7 weeks later before the first COVID-19 case was confirmed in the Bushbuckridge Local Municipality. According to a statement made by the Mpumalanga Department of Health, Bushbuckridge recorded its first case after an official at Mapulaneng Hospital tested positive on the 24th of April 2020. Bushbuckridge has the second lowest number of confirmed COVID-19 infections within its district, with third lowest death rate.

As at 22nd August 2020, the Ehlanzeni District Municipality, of which Bushbuckridge Local Municipality is a part of consists of three (3) other local municipalities and had the following breakdown of COVID-19 cases;

COVID-19 South African National Lockdown
The South African President Cyril Ramaphosa declared that the country will invoke the Disaster Management Act: Declaration of a National State of Disaster and further announced a number of measures to be undertaken to contain the spread of the Coronavirus. A 21-day national lockdown was thus declared, which commenced on the 26th March 2020, with the intention minimize and prevent further spread of the disease and minimize its impact on South African society. The South African Police Services (SAPS) and the army assisted throughout the country, with the enforcement of these lockdown regulations which included restrictions on movement / travel, shutdown of airports, closure of schools & places of work, wearing of masks, curfew times and many other regulations which were accordingly gazetted. These regulations as well as the process of tracing all those who have been in contact with an infected person appeared to be effective in controlling the spread of the disease. Several coronavirus helplines were established for immediate emergency response from the police, health care services, rapid response to crime, fire service, and other critical service delivery needs of society.

COVID-19 lockdown in Bushbuckridge

 * Following the introduction of lockdown restrictions, military vehicles were also deployed in Bushbuckridge, Mpumalanga to ensure that people stay at home, there are areas that had poor police and army visibility which resulted regulations being ignored. Those that ignored lockdown regulations often  gave excuses that they needed to provide for their families and can’t stay at home while they are hungry and had no food on the table. For this reason, it  was business as usual for such areas with a lot of people wondering the streets, and township businesses and informal traders were in normal operation until late at night. Areas such as Mbuzini, Mangweni, Langeloop and Schuzendal are but some of those Bushbuckridge areas that had community members roaming the streets and going about their normal activities during the national lockdown.


 * The Mpumalanga province was one of the first to received mobile testing units, through which healthcare workers conducted COVID-19 screening and testing in areas such as Bushbuckridge. The screening process involved community door to door screening for COVID-19 related symptoms and contact with infected persons, and for the Bushbuckridge local municipality it took place between the 29th April and 08th May 2020. The programme went well and received positive response from the community.

When engaged for screening, the community requested positive identification from the health workers to confirm if they were indeed from the health department. They further wanted to know if they would be allowed to sign any consent forms for the screening and testing and other questions around the coronavirus such as how they would know if they are positive, what would happen after they test positive, what they would need to do to recover, etc.

To maintain social distancing during the screening process, elders were given chairs to sit to which were places 1 – 2 metres apart and it ensured that they are standing for long.

The Negative Impacts of Covid-19 in Bushbuckridge
Lost Employment: Due to the lockdown restrictions a lot of people in the Bushbuckridge area lost their jobs and had source of income since then, affecting most those in informal trades. The issue was further exacerbated by their failure to receive the COVID-19 Unemployment Insurance Fund (UIF) relief due to their employers not having accordingly registered them with department of labour.

Non-Attendance of School: With the Bushbuckridge area being predominantly rural, the majority of parents and pupils cannot afford online schooling as they do not have access to computers or laptops. The result of this was that teachers were not able to prepare teaching materials from their homes and the pupils were not able to attend any online class from while at home.

Non-refundable cancelled social events: Planned social events such as weddings, parties and stokvels had to be cancelled as no social gatherings were allowed as per the lockdown restrictions. Expenses already incurred for these events were not always recoverable resulting in the affected losing their money.

Lack of Income: Rural areas such as Bushbuckridge have a lot of informal and small businesses such as spaza shops / tuckshops which had to close down resulting in the business owners not having any source of income and thus unable to provide for their families. They would also not qualify for any of the COVID-19 relief grants as such business are not officially registered or licensed with the relevant bodies of state. Lack of Policing Services: On the 21st August 2020, the South African Police Service (SAPS) released a statement informing the community of Bushbuckridge that the community police station has been closed due to a member of the SAPS testing positive for COVID-19. The police station was temporarily closed down, which affected during the period as there is no other police station close by.

Reduced access / quality of healthcare service: The COVID-19 crisis has put left healthcare facilities such as hospitals and clinics with reduced resources and capacity owing to the high concentration of COVID-19 cases they have had to deal with. The healthcare facilities were overwhelmed by the surge of COVID-19 in the area and province at large. Some of these facilities has had to close down in the period due to either financial constraints or the employees having contracted the coronavirus. Both the public and private institutions battled with an increase in number of patients and a continuing decrease in staff as COVID-19 takes a deadly toll on overstretched health workers.

The Positive Impacts of Covid-19 in Bushbuckridge
Special Unemployment Grants: The government of South Africa announced a special COVID-19 unemployment relief grant for the youth to the value of R350 per month to assist them deal with the effect of the pandemic. The grant would have benefited the youths that have not been working even prior to the pandemic yet not qualify for any social relief grant. Food Parcels: The government introduced food parcels across the country with the rural and impoverished areas such as Bushbuckridge taking priority in the distribution of these.

Unemployment Insurance Fund: Employers that were not able to operate in the period continued paying their staff even when they stayed home and in occasions such could not afford to do so, they assisted the staff claim their salary or portion thereof from the Unemployment Insurance Fund ( UIF). Social Services: The Department of Water and Sanitation (DWS) delivered 45 water tanks to the Bushbuckridge Local Municipality to aid the municipality in ensuring reliable water supply to the communities of this rural community. The water tanks meant to ensure that communities could practice good hygiene and regularly wash their hands to curb the spread of the deadly coronavirus. Ngwetsi Ntshuruge village for instance, suffered for a very long time the with lack of water due to their two (2) damaged boreholes engines, benefited from COVID-19 water tanks.

New Technology Adoption: The COVID-19 pandemic forced the Bushbuckridge local municipality accelerate their technology adoption and move to online meetings and collaboration. The use of virtual meetings was a foreign concept prior to the pandemic however since the adoption some employees can work from home yet participate in work duties and responsibilities.

Schools around Bushbuckridge, the province and country at large also introduced online learning platforms and allowed students and pupils to participate via online meting platforms such as Dojo, Zoom, Microsoft Teams and Google Meet as a form of educating learners while at home.

Impact of COVID-19 in the Bushbuckridge Department of Health
On the 29th of April 2020 an employee of the Department of Health tested positive for the coronavirus. Following the one incident several other positive cases were confirmed at the Bushbuckridge district municipality, however both the Department of Health and union representative refused to temporarily close the affected hospital despite the external pressure to close. The Department reported that an assessment was done, and it was concluded that services should continue because there was a decontamination process that was conducted.

The department ensured that staff members that tested positive were isolated and quarantined. Since these cases, the department put measures in place to ensure that all staff members and visitors were screened before entering the premises.

COVID-19 has caused an increased demand on the critical care resources at both public and private hospitals. According to the Democratic Nursing Organization of South Africa (DENOSA) Mpumalanga provincial secretary, the organisation is not happy with how their nursing staff members are treated at hospitals. The organisation has demanded security to be upgraded for health care facilities, after few incidents of criminals entering hospitals and holding staff hostage. The Witbank hospital manager, in Emalahleni complained that alcohol abuse is the influence of all fights that happen over the weekends which result in victims occupying hospital beds that could otherwise be used for COVID-19 patients.

It is evident that the Bushbuckridge area was adversely affected by the Coronavirus Disease like any other rural area of South Africa.