As baby Luvolwethu Mana walks down the wide passages of Dora Nginza Hospital in her walking ring, nurses and mothers alike say how cute the eight-month-old is.
But they are nervous – at any moment she can turn blue and stop breathing.
Luvolwethu was born with a heart defect called a double aortic arch and she needs surgery – but for now all doctors, nurses and her mother, Gloria, 33, can do is wait for a space on the list at the Red Cross War Memorial Children’s Hospital to open up.
“The doctors and nurses have been very good to us. We are all nervous,” Mana, who is from Somerset East, said on Wednesday.
“I am desperate. It is very scary.
“You can play with her one minute and the next she will turn blue.
“She will stop breathing.
“Her heart stops beating. It is like she just cuts out.
“The last time it happened even the nurses were upset.
“It took them a long time to bring her back. It was like she was dead.”
She said her baby had been born on August 2 2018.
“There was nothing wrong with her.
“Only when she was two months, she turned blue one day.
“I took her to the clinic and they sent us to the hospital.
“They said they did not know what was wrong.”
The trips to the hospital became so frequent that Mana had to give up her part-time job as a general worker.She has been at the hospital with her baby since January 3.“When they sent us here she was very ill.“We were in the intensive care unit for two weeks.“Then in the ward, and then she turned blue again so we went back to the intensive care unit.”They were discharged for a short while in March.“Then she got the flu and she started vomiting blood,” Mana said.In March, Luvolwethu was sent for a CT scan at Livingstone Hospital and the aorta problem was found.“I am broke,” Mana said. “I can’t tell you how scared you get when your child turns blue.“Every time I think she is dead, but she comes back.”Eastern Cape health department spokesperson Lwandile Sicwetsha said he would investigate.