Shortage of medicines and other essential medical equipment X- Ray machines, foetal monitors, equipment to monitor the progress of labour, insufficient incubators are just a few of the key medical equipment that hospitals lack. This equipment is essential in order for the medical personnel to perform their duties. In terms of medicines, hospital supplies, particularly in relation to chronic medication, which is very quickly depleted as some hospitals are more accessible to rural communities than some of the local clinics. Overcrowding in hospitals This presents a major challenge and is mainly due to the poor referral system between hospitals. This challenge is exacerbated by insufficient ambulances which results in patients that have been stabilized and that are able to return to local hospitals or clinics and are forced to remain at the district and provincial hospitals longer than necessary. This increases the risks of infection between mothers who have just given birth and also to high risk infants who have been reduced to sharing incubators due to overcrowding.