Face to Face: Professor Soraya Seedat on the ‘workings of the brain’ and the realities of psychiatry in SA

Posted in: Healthcare system, Healthcare Workers, Latest, Mental Health

Professor Soraya Seedat is a distinguished professor and head of Stellenbosch University’s psychiatry department. She has penned several hundreds of peer-reviewed journal articles and book chapters on psychiatric disorders, with a focus on PTSD and anxiety, particularly among children and in resource-constrained settings. Biénne Huisman sat down with her to talk about her work, what drives her, and maintaining a work-life equilibrium.

Face to Face: Professor Soraya Seedat on the ‘workings of the brain’ and the realities of psychiatry in SA

Opinion: Urgent course correction needed on NHI, climate change, and economic policy

Posted in: Child health, Healthcare system, Latest, NHI

Unless we get ahead of both the climate crisis and the current levels of pervasive injustice, we will never be able to catch up – even if the National Health Insurance Project achieves what it originally intended, argues Professor Louis Reynolds.

Opinion: Urgent course correction needed on NHI, climate change, and economic policy

OPINION: Mid-term budget fails to show the way to a more resilient recovery

Posted in: Healthcare system, Latest

The Medium-term Budget Policy Statement (MTBPS) was tabled amid a grim global economic outlook and a climate of increasing political uncertainty, electricity supply challenges, and very high unemployment. Russell Rensburg argues the MTBPS fails to provide a credible path toward a resilient recovery and sets out what can be done to strengthen governance and build social solidarity around the recovery we need.

OPINION: Mid-term budget fails to show the way to a more resilient recovery

Opinion: Better data is first step in improving services for persons with disabilities

Posted in: COVID-19, Healthcare system, Latest

South Africa ratified the UN Convention on the Rights of People with Disabilities in 2007 – but the data needed to track the implementation of the convention in South Africa is often incomparable across sectors, of low quality, or completely lacking. This limits civil society’s ability to hold the government accountable and makes it impossible to ensure equity for marginalised groups in how government plans, budgets, and implements services, argues Rural Rehab South Africa’s outgoing chair, Maryke Bezuidenhout.

Opinion: Better data is first step in improving services for persons with disabilities

OPINION: Towards women-centred climate change decision-making and budgeting

Posted in: Healthcare system, Latest

The worsening climate crisis poses a threat to women and girls and their access to healthcare in the country. Matshidiso Lencoasa argues that although the ongoing climate crisis is daunting, it can serve as an opportunity for budgeting and policy-making processes to centre the most vulnerable and protect women’s right to healthcare.

OPINION: Towards women-centred climate change decision-making and budgeting

Women in Health: Mary Selona is changing ‘the way things are’ – one woman at a time

Posted in: Healthcare system, Healthcare Workers, Latest, Reproductive Health, SRHR

Mary Selona, a community activist who heads up the Blood River Advice Centre in Limpopo, is putting women at the centre in her quest for social justice. Whether it is intervening when women are refused PrEP at clinics or in more immediate life-threatening situations relating to gender-based violence, Selona is leading from the front. Ufrieda Ho spoke to her as part of Spotlight’s Women in Health series.

Women in Health: Mary Selona is changing ‘the way things are’ – one woman at a time

Intimate partner violence in SA – is it getting worse and how do we tackle it?

Posted in: Healthcare system, Latest, Mental Health

A third or even up to half of women and girls in South Africa aged 15 and older have either experienced physical or sexual intimate partner violence (IPV). Some experts say South Africa almost has a perfect storm of IPV drivers. Elsabé Brits unpacks some of the recent findings published in a landmark Lancet Psychiatry Commission on interpersonal violence and asks experts how we can address this in South Africa.

Intimate partner violence in SA – is it getting worse and how do we tackle it?

Opinion: The new health system we build through the NHI must be green

Posted in: Spotlight

The recent floods in KwaZulu-Natal and the Eastern Cape showed us how climate change harms people’s health and healthcare services. On the other hand, modern health care systems contribute to climate change through large greenhouse gas emissions. In the development of South Africa’s National Health Insurance system we have an opportunity to address both these sides of the challenge that climate change poses for health systems, argues Dr Louis Reynolds of the People’s Health Movement SA.

Opinion: The new health system we build through the NHI must be green

Opinion: Reframing the right to healthcare in terms of insurance cover is a bad idea

Posted in: Healthcare system, Latest, NHI, Spotlight on NHI

Framing the fundamental human right to healthcare as insurance cover opens it up for exploitation. It blocks any possibility of achieving equity in health care. Here Dr Louis Reynolds from the People’s Health Movement of South Africa explains why and how.

Opinion: Reframing the right to healthcare in terms of insurance cover is a bad idea

Report raises concern over child nutrition in rural Eastern Cape

Posted in: Child health, COVID-19, Eastern Cape, Healthcare system, Latest, Provinces

Findings from a study conducted in Mqanduli in the Eastern Cape show the prevalence of stunting among children younger than five for that area was 24%. Luvuyo Mehlwana unpacks the findings and the plans the provincial health department has in place to address the risk factors driving stunting among children in the Eastern Cape.

Report raises concern over child nutrition in rural Eastern Cape

HIV in Umkhanyakude: Impressive numbers, but living with HIV difficult amid socio-economic hardship

Posted in: HIV/AIDS, KwaZulu-Natal, Latest, Provinces

Premier of KwaZulu-Natal, Sihle Zikhalala praised the Umkhanyakude District recently on its ‘exceptional’ figures in meeting the UNAIDS 90-90-90 targets. Yet, when Spotlight recently visited the Jozini area, we were confronted with a less rosy picture. Some people stopped their HIV treatment because they do not have food to eat, and activists now warn that the progress with the targets can be derailed if poverty, hunger and other social determinants of health are not urgently and comprehensively addressed. Nomfundo Xolo reports.

HIV in Umkhanyakude: Impressive numbers, but living with HIV difficult amid socio-economic hardship

EMS and clinic woes continue for the people of Xhora Mouth in Eastern Cape

Posted in: Access to Medicines, Eastern Cape, Edition 13: Eastern Cape Health, Healthcare system, Latest, Provinces

It is more than a year since Spotlight visited the Xhora Mouth area in the Eastern Cape to report on the locals’ challenges in accessing health care services. Now, a year later, not much has changed. Luvuyo Mehlwana reports.