More dialogue needed on NHI – health officials
With the second meeting of the G20 Health Working Group
concluding in KZN this week, officials say it is clear there needs to be more
dialogue about the National Health Insurance.
Health officials from G20 members states, invited countries and organisations descended on Zimbali near Ballito for the three-day summit.
Top of the agenda was Universal Health Coverage and how to fund it, with a focus on strengthening primary healthcare services.
South Africa's version, the NHI, was signed into law last year. Concerns have been raised about how it will be funded and implemented.
The Act has also been legally challenged by private hospitals and medical aid schemes.
READ: G20 health experts to discuss funding cuts, aid
Ramphelane Morewane, who is the Acting Deputy Director General of Maternal and Child Health at the National Health Department, says discussions must be inclusive of ordinary citizens.
"But until in the dialogic engagement, the end user, the one who is dependent on the state to care for their lives, is able to give their views then the views of South Africans are not complete. NHI must not only be done in English, but we must also be able to translate it in the language that is understandable to the ordinary man street, we must be able to reference it.
"And people that are raising these voices are highly educated people. Sometimes I say, but let people write up and say, ‘In Mexico, they tried it, and it collapsed the country, in Brazil, they tried it, it collapsed the country.’ They must be able to give examples. You don't make one example and then it becomes an issue.”
At the same time, the South African National Aids Council’s CEO Thembisile Xulu has pleaded with those concerned about NHI to come to the table.
"There are some dissenting voices and what we need to do is to take each of them into comfort and into discussion and understand what the concerns are. In Covid, the public sector and the private sector were working well together, but when you look at it now, 86% of South Africans are not on medical insurance.
"Parents who earn even social grants should not be made to choose ‘do I buy food? Do I take my child to school? Do I pay for the fact that they're sick?]"
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