Death toll in Joburg fire rises to 77

The death toll of the fire that engulfed a building in Joburg’s CBD on Thursday, has risen to 77. 

Three more people who sustained serious burned wounds passed away in the past two days, the Gauteng department of health has confirmed. 

Out of the 88 people that were admitted at various health facilities (Chris Hani Baragwanath Academic Hospital, Charlotte Maxeke Johannesburg Academic Hospital, Helen Joseph Hospital, South Rand Hospital, Tembisa Hospital, Rahima Moosa Mother and Child Hospital and Hillbrow Community Health Centre) only 31 are still receiving care.  

Gauteng department of health spokesperson, Motalatale Modiba said: “Of the 31 patients in admission, only five still need semi-critical care however, they are fully awake. The admitted patients are not impacting on the normal flow of trauma patients in facilities. Sadly, three patients have since demised in hospital with the third one declared today [02 September]. This brings the number of people who have passed away from the incident to 77. 

“Processing of the deceased as more families come forth to report their loved ones who might have perished in the fire incident is on track to complete conducting post-mortems on the 74 deceased bodies. By Saturday evening, pathologists had done post-mortems on 58 bodies and were only left with 16 to be concluded on Sunday.  There are 62 unidentifiable bodies at the Diepkloof Forensic Pathology Services mortuary and 12 identifiable corpses.” 

Modiba further explained that about 40 families have come forward to report their loved ones since the incident happened. He said nine families have already identified their loved ones from the 12 identifiable bodies.  

“Once the families conclude the necessary processes and produce the required identification documents, the mortal remains will be released to them for burial. The South African Police Service Victim Identification Centre has been hard at work and so far, 43 DNA samples have been taken from the 74 bodies with 13 antemortem swabbing (DNA samples for families) linking to 23 of the unidentifiable people have been done. 

“Antemortem samples will only be taken from the siblings or the parent of the deceased. Once the samples are taken for the deceased and from the family members, they will be cross-referenced to match them as part of liking families of their deceased loved one.”