Safna President and forensic nurse by profession, Priscilla Monyobo, tells OFM News, the remaining nurses have been placed elsewhere in the health system, despite specialising in the field. Monyobo says nearly 21 years since nursing pioneer, Virginia Lynch, trained the first group of forensic nurses in South Africa, their functions remain inadequately articulated within the country’s health system.

“Let’s first use the resources that we have adequately, let’s place them where the services are required and then after placing them, we will determine the gap or we will determine further training that is required. The government and the department do not need to retrain,” says Monyobo.

There are a total of 401 forensic nurses and sexual assault nurse examiners (SANE) in the country, despite them being greatly underutilised in some parts of the country.

OFM News previously reported Safna is of the view that forensic nurses must be placed at the centre of the government’s National Strategic Plan on Gender-based Violence and Femicide. Monyobo believes that this is one way to help strengthen the implementation of the 10-year plan which was put together by the Gender-based Violence and Femicide Steering Committee founded in 2019, following the Presidential Summit into the scourge of violence against women and children in the country in 2018.

“Most of the Thuthuzela care centres are forensic nurse-driven,” argues Monyobo. These centres, which are the brainchild of the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA), were established in 2006 and have been defined by government as “one-stop facilities that have been introduced as a critical part of South Africa's anti-rape strategy, aiming to reduce secondary victimisation and to build a case ready for successful prosecution”.

OFM News’ interview with Monyobo comes less than a month before the 16 days of activism against gender-based violence kicks off at the end of November.

OFM News