While the Delta Variant is scaring officials and leading to more lockdowns around the world, the situation in South Africa is worsening day by day, according to CNN.
At one hospital in Johannesburg, which has been hit particularly hard, medics have to turn away ambulances carrying COVID-19 patients.
"It's devastating, it's soul destroying. We are trained to save lives, but you revert to that wartime mentality. You revert to becoming numbed, you revert to becoming blunted," a senior doctor at a major public hospital in South Africa's largest city told CNN.
"Patients are being brought in in cars with desperately ill patients who have been turned away from other hospitals with no beds."
And COVID-19 does not discriminate. The mayor of Johannesburg Cllr Geoffrey Makhubo died on Friday after contracting the virus.
"It is my sad duty to confirm that the Executive Mayor of the City of Johannesburg, Cllr Geoffrey Makhubo has indeed succumbed to Covid-19," said acting Executive Mayor and Member of the Mayoral Committee Eunice Mgcina via the official Twitter account of the city's authorities.
It is my sad duty to confirm that the Executive Mayor of the City of Johannesburg,Cllr Geoffrey Makhubo has indeed succumbed to Covid-19,says Cllr Eunice Mgcina acting Executive Mayor and Member of the Mayoral Committee (MMC)for Health and Social Development #RIPGeoffMakhubo ^NB
— City of Joburg (@CityofJoburgZA) July 9, 2021
According to doctors, sometimes the only way a bed will open is when a patient dies. This leaves doctors and nurses struggling to wrap the bodies quickly enough and make room. Some doctors have to resort to treating patients at home, but even this is not enough.
"There are patients that are dying while they are waiting to be seen, while they are waiting to go to the ward. Because the resources are just being overwhelmed by the onslaught of patients," the doctor said.
Like many healthcare workers, they have chosen to remain anonymous out of fear of reprisals from the government.
"Patients are looking to us, they are relying on us to do our best, but it isn't good enough. There is a that sense no matter how much I do, it is going to be the same thing tomorrow and the next day and the next day and the next day,"