As COVID-19 case numbers continue to rise, so does the need for hospital beds. Kathryn Cleary explores the agreements that will see some public sector COVID-19 patients going to private hospitals and asks what this means for NHI.
President Cyril Ramaphosa has vowed to act strongly against any corruption and profiteering from the COVID-19 crisis but the systems in place to guard against this may be falling short. Spotlight looked at preliminary spending figures and asked some experts about how public money can be safeguarded during this time.
This is issue 7 of COVID-19 Report. We point you to the latest quality science on the pandemic.
Strict COVID-19 measures have had a negative impact on a programme aimed at providing HIV prevention medicine and gender based violence counselling services for vulnerable girls and young women. Adele Baleta reports.
As COVID-19 cases begin to surge in the North West province one of the province’s leading clinicians has just been suspended for reasons that are unclear. Ufrieda Ho reports.
The Northern Cape Health Department has come under fire from NEHAWU, the DA, residents and healthcare workers for not testing enough and dragging its feet with its COVID-19 response. Refilwe Mekoa and Alicestine October investigate.
The spraying of sanitisers on people in special tunnels or booths in order to combat COVID-19 has been condemned by scientists and government as unnecessary and potentially harmful. Some manufacturers nevertheless continue to market these products. Elna Schütz investigates.
A recent Pretoria High Court judgment declared the regulations under South Africa’s lockdown alert levels 3 and 4 invalid and unconstitutional. This case may well be overturned on appeal, but provides a critical opportunity for government to redirect and base its decision-making processes on transparency and participation.
Some studies have suggested there may be a link between people’s vitamin D levels and COVID-19 outcomes, but local experts say there is little evidence to support this. Kathryn Cleary reports.
Concerns are mounting over people stopping or not starting tuberculosis and HIV treatment during South Africa’s COVID-19 lockdown. Nomfundo Xolo spoke to activists and people living with HIV and TB in Hammonds Farm in Verulam in KwaZulu-Natal about the challenges they face.
EDITORIAL: That the wave of infections and deaths is growing and will soon break over us is inevitable. There are no silver bullets that can make it all go away, certainly no quick fixes to hope for from a largely incapacitated state and a public healthcare system that was already in crisis prior to the pandemic.
When sangoma Gcinani Bango tested positive for COVID-19, he thought he was “counting his last days”. Now, after his discharge from hospital, Bango tells Siyabonga Kamnqa about his fears before contracting the disease and the hope he now has for educating people on preventing transmission of the virus.