Health services in SA need a bigger budget

IN 2017, around October, I lodged a complaint with the Office of Health Standards Compliance about my sisterin-law who was diabetic and hypertensive, an elderly patient, on old age pension at the time. She passed away in December 2020. She attended a clinic in Rustenburg.

The story about patients on chronic medication having to go on for months without medication, and sometimes being advised by nurses to buy medication from private pharmacies has been an ongoing problem and was the reason I brought the matter to the attention of the OHSC.

I learnt in the City Press this past Sunday patients are still unable to get their chronic medication both from clinics and hospitals, but it seems now the health officials are aware this is due to insufficient budget allocation.

According to the City Press, the budget allocation for the 2022/23 financial year, for the North West province is R15.1 billion, a drop in the ocean. It is further reported that R1.2bn of that amount will be used to settle accruals from previous years.

Instead of simply complaining about underfunding that leads to untold suffering for the patients, it is crucial for provinces to help treasury to know what their annual budgetery requirements are. The finance minister needs such input from all the provinces if we are to move away from this ridiculously low budget that is always allocated to the Department of Health.