Weeks after pledging to end child stunting by 2030, President Cyril Ramaphosa has kick-started a task team to drive this urgent national mission. But what concrete steps could government actually take to end stunting? Spotlight sat down for an in-depth interview with one of the country’s leading experts on the issue.
Healthcare funding is always about trade-offs, writes Thoneshan Naidoo, CEO of the Health Funders Association. The hardest question in healthcare is not what we would like to provide, he argues, but what we can provide sustainably, fairly and at scale.
The wins are there but the underlying reality remains, writes Professor Kogie Naidoo as she likens TB to a bridesmaid awaiting its turn to garner attention. The analogy is relevant given the overwhelming number of new TB infections and deaths each year globally for a disease persistently sitting in the shadow of other communicable and non-communicable diseases.
The persistence of TB is a reminder that medical solutions alone are not enough. Renier Coetzee and Ingrid Schoeman write that the disease thrives in conditions shaped by social injustice, including poverty, overcrowded housing, under-resourced health systems, and unequal access to care.
The only tuberculosis vaccine we have is a century old and offers only limited efficacy in children. With leading South African researchers involved in the pivotal clinical trials of three new tuberculosis vaccine candidates, we are on the verge of a major breakthrough, writes Associate Professor Angelique Kany Kany Luabeya.
The new government TB dashboard is a step forward for transparency and accountability in South Africa’s response to the ancient, but still deadly, disease. It is critical that we use it wisely to boost our testing efforts, argues a group of South Africa’s leading TB activists ahead of World TB Day on March 24th.
Universal health coverage cannot succeed with fragmented systems, weak data, and largely symbolic participation. A recent court-ordered pause to NHI implementation offers a chance to build the foundations properly, argue Dr Haseena Majid and Professor Mogie Subban.
Maryke Bezuidenhout is constantly on the road in rural, northern KwaZulu-Natal visiting and helping people with disabilities where they live. As part of Spotlight’s new Rural Health Heroes series, writer Sue Segar and photographer Thom Pierce tagged along with her.
District managers in South Africa’s public healthcare system currently have to juggle funding from multiple government budget lines, each with different strings attached. To improve district health services, we urgently need to simplify and integrate these funding flows, argues Russell Rensburg.
From academic corridors to ministerial meetings and rural reaches, Leslie London has never shied away from speaking truth to power. Biénne Huisman speaks to the Emeritus Professor at the University of Cape Town, who, still in his bright signature shirt and trademark wry grin, continues to fight health inequity.
Vigilantes have unlawfully prevented people they deemed to be foreign nationals from accessing public healthcare services. SECTION27 health activists map out the implications of a Gauteng High Court judgment delivered at the end of last year, explaining that it obliges the state to take active and coordinated steps to remove barriers hindering people’s access to healthcare.
It is not a stretch to say that the NHI Act has been one of the most controversial pieces of legislation in post-apartheid South Africa.
