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LIFE HEALTHCARE GROUP HOLDINGS LIMITED - Voluntary announcement to market: cyber incident

Release Date: 09/06/2020 07:05
Code(s): LHC     PDF:  
Wrap Text
Voluntary announcement to market: cyber incident

LIFE HEALTHCARE GROUP HOLDINGS LIMITED
(Incorporated in the Republic of South Africa)
(Registration number: 2003/002733/06)
ISIN: ZAE000145892
Share Code: LHC
("Life Healthcare" or "the Group" or "the Company")

VOLUNTARY ANNOUNCEMENT TO MARKET: CYBER INCIDENT

The Company regrets to inform shareholders that its southern African operation has been the
victim of a targeted criminal attack on its IT systems. We acted immediately on becoming aware
of the incident and took our systems offline, in order to actively contain the attack. The extent to
which sensitive data has been compromised is yet to be determined as we are still in the process
of investigating the incident. External cyber security experts and forensic teams have been
brought on board to advise and supplement our internal teams and capacity. We have alerted the
relevant authorities and investigations are underway.

Patient care has not been impacted and LHC continues to provide quality healthcare across all of
its hospitals and clinics, with patient care continuing to be our foremost priority.

In line with our business continuity plans, our hospitals and administrative offices have switched
over to backup manual processing systems and continue to function, albeit and regrettably, with
some administrative delays. The security incident has affected admissions systems, business
processing systems and email servers. We immediately took these offline as a precautionary
measure to contain the attack, conduct our investigations, and where necessary, commence
remediation.

We apologise for any frustration, delay, or distress this criminal act has caused to our patients,
doctors, employees, funders and other stakeholders. We thank them for their understanding,
support and patience as we resolve this matter.

Pieter Van der Westhuizen, Acting Group CEO said:
"First, and foremost, we wish to assure all the communities within which we operate, that this
criminal attack on our systems will not affect the quality care and clinical excellence we aim to
provide. Patient care remains our key priority. We are deeply disappointed and saddened that
criminals would attack our facilities during such a time, when we are all working tirelessly and
collectively to fight the COVID-19 pandemic. However, we will not be distracted, and will continue
to place our patients first. We regret that the disruption caused by this incident may cause our
patients some frustration, in what is already a trying time. We recognise and thank our employees,
doctors and service providers for their dedication, and the professionalism they have shown by
quickly adopting our manual backup systems. Our investigations continue and we are working
around-the-clock to restore the affected systems."

Illovo
9th June 2020

Sponsor
RAND MERCHANT BANK (a Division of FirstRand Bank Limited)

Date: 09-06-2020 07:05:00
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