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When Jesus calls

Sister on C ward

I am half way through my round on C ward, the female medical ward. Out of the corner of my eye I become aware of two well dressed women standing a couple of metres away and radiating that powerful aura that so effectively says “I am waiting for you” to your subconscious. I have never learnt how to ignore it and within a few seconds find myself completely incapable of concentrating on the task in hand.

I turn to them. “Can I help you?” They step forward, clutching the familiar bulk of the death certification papers.

“Yes please doctor. Could you sign these?” says the first in perfect English. I take the papers. There are several of these most days – my record is 7 deaths (20% of the ward but that was over a weekend and shouldn't be counted). They must be signed by a doctor to confirm the cause of death before the body leaves for the undertaker. Half the cases we have no idea what actually killed the patient and write “Pneumonia, ?HIV”. A GP in a town 50km away did a week long course on how to do post-mortems apparently – we send the suspicious cases to him – but there is no system for confirming causes of death in those cases where the diagnosis is unknown as there is in the UK.

I flick through the papers and look up at them in dismay. “But this lady was doing fine yesterday!”

“Yes doctor. We came yesterday and she was well. She told us she was being discharged.”

“Yes – but she was young and she was nearly completely better. I am so sorry. I don’t know what happened.”

“Oh doctor. Do not worry.”

“But she was better. She was walking around and complaining that she was bored.”

“Doctor. There was nothing you could have done.”

“Thank you but I am so sorry.”

“Doctor. If Jesus calls someone then there is nothing even you could do about it.”

I sign the papers, again having to make something up as I have no idea what killed the poor woman. Do you know what the a South African’s life expectancy is these days?

48. Much lower if you take out the wealthy city people.

It seems to me that if the lady’s logic were true Jesus seems to want an awful lot of young Zulus.

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