'Healthcare has collapsed'

LazyLion

LazyLion

King of de Jungle
Joined
Mar 17, 2005
Messages
107,564
Reaction score
10,192
Location
District 9
http://www.iol.co.za/news/politics/healthcare-has-collapsed-1.1382196

Pretoria - Gauteng public health facilities are in a state of collapse and failing to deliver quality healthcare to patients after tender irregularities, running into billions, dealt the system a hard blow, Health Minister Dr Aaron Motsoaledi admitted on Wednesday.

Disclosing that the province’s hospitals were running out of essentials due to huge deficits in their budgets, and that efforts to rebuild the system could take a while, Motsoaledi explained that the problems had grown steadily over the past few years and were about to explode now.

“From around 2007, hospitals have been issuing a lot of heavy tenders that had nothing to do with healthcare, leaving no money for the essentials,” the minister said.

Describing the process as that of replacing “healthcare” with “tendercare”, he said: “They bought nice-to-haves, leaving no money for the essentials and resulting in the department being unable to pay for accruals and creditors.”

While the bulk of the money went to ill-awarded tenders, some essential service providers continued providing services despite the non-payment, with the hope that payments would eventually come, and also because they did not want to lose business with government.

When current MEC of Tourism and Economic Development Qedani Mahlangu took over at health, she took some of the tenderpreneurs to court in an attempt to stop payments, and while she won some cases, she also lost a large number.

“Judges said they understood the fact that the money had been committed towards non-essentials but they also pointed out to the legality of the contracts and instructed that they be paid,” Motsoaledi said.

Essential services providers also took the department to court, forcing the department to pay them: “It is these payments that are crippling us, because we take money from existing budgets, even money meant for tablets, to pay them,” he said.

For more than a year now, public health facilities in the province have been hit by service delivery problems, which have seen the non-maintenance of equipment and non-delivery of key services as a result of non-payment to service providers. Patients have been turned away, procedures cancelled or postponed and, medical staff have said, they have been forced to “play God” by choosing which patients to treat and which to let go, something they claim demoralised and affected them psychologically.

According to Motsoaledi, the fact that the Gauteng Department of Health was the biggest in Africa made the effects of the breakdown more acute. This is exacerbated by the increased patient burden on the province’s four central hospitals, which include Steve Biko Academic Hospital, Charlotte Maxeke Johannesburg Academic and Chris Hani Baragwanath hospitals in Joburg, and the medical schools attached to some of them.

He said: “The whole of the North West, the whole of Limpopo and the whole of Mpumalanga refer here, because while some hospitals might have facilities, equipment and pharmaceuticals, they do not have the expertise.”

Swaziland, he said, also officially referred the patients they couldn’t treat to these hospitals, while complicated cases from elsewhere in the country were also referred to Gauteng. “This kind of system should not have been disturbed, because the ripple effects go beyond the patients but into the lives of all South Africans.

“The people who brought our healthcare system to its knees have been referred to the Special Investigations Unit (SIU), and while this will not fix the problem, those to blame need to be held accountable by bringing criminal charges against them,” the minister said, adding that he was eagerly waiting for the SIU report to bring closure to the problem.

Interventions are being put into place to prevent this from ever happening again. For the past six months, a committee had sat and identified the “non-negotiables”, which every facility had to have to run effectively.

Motsoaledi said these included pharmaceuticals; basic equipment, including laundry equipment; infection control measures; food; items on the dry dispensary list, like catheters, syringes and gloves; and, the payment of service providers.

“We must protect the health system at all costs,” he said. All South Africans needed to buy into this phenomenon, he said, to ensure that even those tenderpreneurs knew which services were essential to health before buying luxury items.

A commission has also been set up to monitor the operations of public health facilities. Inspectors will make unannounced visits to facilities to check up on operations, the state of cleanliness, queues and infection control, among others, and an Ombudsman, to investigate complaints, has been appointed.
Click to expand...

And yet the morons will keep voting for these schmucks. :mad:
 
T-minus 1 hour until some idiot from the brigade tells us to be part of the solution/go out and help/stop whining/everything is rosy ....... instead of seeing the article for what it is
 
There are several pie in the sky ideas from the ANC, all designed to gather votes, not benefit the populace

National Health System
Nationalising certain privately owned assets

While other countries de-regulate and reap the benefits, we are still going backwards
 
All aboard the African fail train .. chooo!! choooooooo!!!!

.---._
..--(. ' .).--. . .-.
. ( ' _) .)` ( .)-. ( ) '-'
( , ). `(' . _)
(') _________ '-'
__ [_________]
\__/ | _ \ || ________
_][__|(")/__|| ,;,;,;, ______ [________]
/ | ,;;;;;;;;;, __________ _(______)_ _| LILI |_
/ _________| | | | | \ | | | ____|
(| .--. .--.| | | | | ) / | | |____ |
/|/ .. \~~~/ .. \_|_.-._|_.-._|_|_.-:_\.-._\_|_.-.__.-._|_|_.-.__.-._|
=/_|\ '' /~~~\ '' /=+( o ) ( o )+==( o )( o )=+=( o )( o )+==( o )( o )=+=
='=='='--'==+='--'===+'-'==='-'==+=='-'+='-'===+='-'=='-'==+=='-'=+'-'
 
evilstebunny said:
All aboard the African fail train .. chooo!! choooooooo!!!!

.---._
..--(. ' .).--. . .-.
. ( ' _) .)` ( .)-. ( ) '-'
( , ). `(' . _)
(') _________ '-'
__ [_________]
\__/ | _ \ || ________
_][__|(")/__|| ,;,;,;, ______ [________]
/ | ,;;;;;;;;;, __________ _(______)_ _| LILI |_
/ _________| | | | | \ | | | ____|
(| .--. .--.| | | | | ) / | | |____ |
/|/ .. \~~~/ .. \_|_.-._|_.-._|_|_.-:_\.-._\_|_.-.__.-._|_|_.-.__.-._|
=/_|\ '' /~~~\ '' /=+( o ) ( o )+==( o )( o )=+=( o )( o )+==( o )( o )=+=
='=='='--'==+='--'===+'-'==='-'==+=='-'+='-'===+='-'=='-'==+=='-'=+'-'
Click to expand...

Even the Choo Choo has failed! :D
 
Impossible Our beloved President Mr Jacob Zuma has just said that they excelled in service delivery.

OOOOH Nooooo some one is lying as usual and hiding the truth from the voters. But hey as long as his 7+ wives gets service delivery and we pay for it who cares!!!
 
It's part of the grand plan

There Shall be Houses, Security and Comfort!

All people shall have the right to live where they choose, be decently housed, and to bring up their families in comfort and security;
Unused housing space shall be made available to the people;
Rent and prices shall be lowered, food plentiful and no-one shall go hungry;
A preventive health scheme shall be run by the state;
Free medical care and hospitalisation shall be provided for all, with special care for mothers and young children;
Slums shall be demolished, and new suburbs built where all have transport, roads, lighting, playing fields, crèches and social centres;
The aged, the orphans, the disabled and the sick shall be cared for by the state.
Click to expand...
 
Public healthcare collapsed many years ago in this country. I wonder when the very same people who are being screwed over by the ANC will stop voting for them.

I have medical aid, wont ever have to set foot in a public hospital (unless I'm visiting someone).
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top
Sign up to the MyBroadband newsletter
X