Tests conducted on sanitisers that were used by an Eastern Cape school where 204 staff and pupils tested positive for Covid-19 indicate that its alcohol content was 57.6% – far below the 70% minimum required.
Makaula Senior Secondary in KwaBhaca (formerly Mount Frere) made national headlines last month after it was forced to shut its doors following the recording of 204 infections. A total of 330 people at the school were tested.
The school’s principal, Luzuko Mbana, 52, had to be airlifted to a private hospital in KwaZulu-Natal on June 24 after he tested positive.
Roderick Walker, a professor of pharmaceutics at Rhodes University in the Eastern Cape, who tested samples from sanitisers supplied to Makaula Senior Secondary and nine other schools in the Alfred Nzo district, found that the percentage of alcohol content ranged from 4.1% to 57.6%.
In an e-mail sent to Linda Lupondwana, director for demand and acquisition in the Eastern Cape education department, Walker said he checked the alcohol content using a Model DMA 35 portable density meter.
“Since the samples were not in the original containers, I cannot vouch for the integrity of the materials received. If the schools diluted these, then there may be differences between the content of what was supplied to them and submitted to me.”
The samples were given to him in cold drink and juice bottles, spray bottles and water bottles.
But “all of the samples I received were nowhere near the minimum 70% content to comply with the requirements for an effective sanitiser”.
The results of the alcohol content in sanitisers used by some of the other schools include:
- Jolobe Junior Secondary School: 4.1%;
- Nkulisa Primary School: 31.9%;
- Mbodleni Senior Secondary: 33.1%; and
- St George’s Senior Secondary: 34.2%.
Walker told Lupondwana in the e-mail: “I am not sure whether you can use this data, but suggest you interrogate the supplier of these and ask for the certificates of analysis if they are selling commercially.”
After Lupondwana received the results, she informed Monwabisi Mbangeni, a director in the Alfred Nzo West district, that the sanitisers delivered by a supplier “were indeed diluted and did not contain 70% alcohol content as required by the specification that was issued by the department”.
She said the district must assist with the process of “recalling” all sanitisers delivered by the specific supplier.
“We will subsequently subject the supplier to consequence management and recording the supplier in the register of defaulters.”
She asked Mbangeni to also check whether other personal protective equipment [PPE], such as the three-layered cloth masks, germ cleaner and thermometer, had met the specifications.
“This is to ensure that we only pay this supplier for what he has delivered with acceptable quality standard.”
Lupondwana also wanted principals to stop accepting PPE unless it was in good order.
The e-mail was forwarded to Themba Kojana, the Eastern Cape education department’s superintendent-general.
Contacted for comment, Mbana, the Makaula Senior Secondary principal, said: “I am in hospital, can you respect that?”
‘Disgraceful’
Basil Manuel, executive director of the National Professional Teachers’ Organisation of SA, said: “It’s disgraceful that there would be people in the system who would rob children and educators possibly of their safety, all to make a quick buck.
“How are these tenders awarded? What is the quality assurance? Is anybody ever checking that the right products are delivered?”
Eastern Cape education MEC Fundile Gade recently admitted in reply a parliamentary question that his department had paid R4,665 each for 25 litres of sanitiser and 25 litres of germ killer, and R2,595 each for thermometers with batteries.
Yusuf Cassim, a DA member in the Eastern Cape provincial legislature, said a quick price check at retail outlets showed the department had paid five times more than the retail price.
“There have been no quality checks conducted on the PPE supplied by more than 250 suppliers. What is even worse than the inflated prices paid by the department is the total disrespect shown to the wellbeing of teachers and learners by supplying substandard PPE.”
He said Eastern Cape teachers tested hand sanitisers supplied by the department and those bought at a local pharmacy.
“The teachers put fire to the two sanitisers and the department’s sanitiser did not burn at all, showing little or no alcohol in the sanitiser.”
Eastern Cape education department spokesperson Loyiso Pulumani said they had recalled all the items supplied by the service provider.
“We condemn this behaviour in the strongest terms as it has put the lives of people at risk.”
Because the actions of the service provider amounted to a breach of trust and contract by providing inferior or substandard work, “appropriate action will be taken to reprimand the supplier”.
He confirmed that the schools had been advised to stop using the sanitisers immediately.
“We have replaced all the items using the school budget. Verification of quality standards of all items provided by the service provider is in the process.”
He said five pupils in five of the schools had tested positive for the virus.