Government and the private sector could work together much more effectively to improve healthcare services in South Africa, but the potential of such a partnership remains largely untapped, delegates heard last week at the Hospital Association of South Africa conference.
In several countries, the public is given an opportunity to share their views with regulators before new medicines are registered or to engage with those choosing essential medicines. In South Africa, however, opportunities for such public participation remains limited. In his latest #InsideTheBox column, Dr Andy Gray takes a look at how public participation is handled elsewhere and how it could be improved here.
Unlike with medicines, and with a few exceptions, South Africa’s regulator does not assess whether diagnostic tests and other medical devices on the market are safe and work as they are supposed to. The regulator has however started down a road that should eventually lead to the regulation of all medical devices in the country. Catherine Tomlinson unpacks the details.
Thousands of people in South Africa are waiting for a life-saving organ transplant, but our very low organ donation rates mean that many won’t get a transplant in time. Elri Voigt asks the experts why our donation rates are so low and what can be done about it.
We need to confront the racialised and class-based structures that still dictate society’s oral health outcomes, argues Dr Bulela Vava as we head toward the end of this year’s National Oral Health Month.
The courts have spoken. The health ombud has issued devastating reports. The Auditor-General has again put damning evidence on the table. Civil society has protested. Yet, the devastating crisis in Gauteng’s health system shows no sign of improvement.
Activists say the Gauteng department of health’s late appeal to a court judgement that compels it to act on cancer treatment backlogs is raising more questions about what the department believes it stands to lose from not doing as the courts have ruled, reports Ufrieda Ho.
Since President Cyril Ramaphposa signed the NHI Act into law last year in May, eight different groups have challenged it in court. One common argument is that it is irrational and unreasonable to restructure the health system when there’s no money to do so. In this feature, Spotlight dissects how the argument is being applied, and whether it has any chance of success.
A new HIV prevention jab has the potential to bring an end to the AIDS epidemic. But a lack of ambition and unjustifiable secrecy over pricing is holding it back, argue three leading health activists.
A child-friendly formulation of the antiretroviral drug dolutegravir was first included in the country’s HIV treatment guidelines in 2023. New estimates suggest that most children aged one to four living with HIV have now been switched to the drug, reports Elri Voigt.
The health department has plans to roll out lenacapavir, a twice-yearly HIV prevention injection, in a select group of public sector clinics by April 2026. Meanwhile, little progress has been made towards rolling out a two-monthly prevention injection, despite the four-year head start this product had on lenacapavir. Catherine Tomlinson reports.
Doctors have blown the whistle about a crisis at one of KwaZulu-Natal’s most important public hospitals, saying it is functioning far under capacity due to a series of crippling cuts. Chris Bateman reports.
