National health minister Zweli Mkhize was the bearer of bad news for smokers and drinkers on Thursday when he said the country was not ready to lift the bans on alcohol and cigarettes.
Mkhize said he had visited Edendale Hospital in Pietermaritzburg earlier in the day and asked an intensive-care doctor about the state of the situation there.
“Our position is very simple: when we see that the numbers are improving and that the need for pressure for beds is not so threatening to the lives of our people, we will reconsider this. We haven’t come to that point yet.” “As far as we are concerned, there are real reasons as to why we support the suspension of alcohol. The bed numbers were actually getting filled and we were running out of beds. We proved it here and everywhere. All the hospitals showed us the figures.
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