History of KwaMashu Community Health Centre

KwaMashu is a location for the black African community and was established in 1959 in terms of the Black authority Act1951.

The land was donated by Marshall Campbell who was a sugar cane farmer and after which it was named ‘KwaMashu” translated into isiZulu.

This location was designed for the population that was forcefully removed from Emkhumbane (Cator Manor) by the Group Areas act. Houses were constructed in phases and occupied by blacks from March 1958.

It is one of the biggest townships in South Africa situated 35 kilometres from the Durban Metropolitan in ward 45 of the district municipality. It is made up of 13 formal settlements and +- 9 informal settlements.

Before 1949, people of this catchment area received medical help from King Edward Hospital which is about +/_ 35 kilometres therefore it was built to decongest King Edward Hospital.

Then it was known as KwaMashu Poly clinic which was operating as a 24 hours service facility in July 1962.It was officially opened and handed over to KwaMashu community in 1962

It was managed by registered nurse Keen, assisted by registered nurse Nkosi who were both deployed from King Edward Hospital.

The main conditions that were attended during 1962 were mainly infectious diseases and malnutrition which were mostly due to inadequate nutrition, largely due to negligence and low socio economic status.

In 2004 the name Poly clinic was changed to KwaMashu Community Health Centre because of the complexity and expansion of the services rendered.

It has a total population of about 750 000 people. It serves as a referral centre for 6 Satellite clinics including 2 municipal clinics, 11 mobile clinics and other health facilities in the PINK (Phoenix, Inanda, Ntuzuma and KwaMashu) area. It has 25 usable beds.

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