Eastern Cape community members and healthcare workers at a recent summit accused the provincial health department of being paralysed.
Testifying of their experiences in the system, they claimed there had been little or no change in the past four years.
Four years ago, a coalition of non-government organisations came together to form the Eastern Cape Health Crisis Action Coalition to fight for the rights of the people of the province.
Coalition spokesman Mluleki Marongo said they had been looking at the emergency medical services (EMS) crisis, human resource challenges and “the general decay and failure of the healthcare system”.
Last October, the South African Human Rights Commission (SAHRC) launched a report into the EMS challenges in the province.
They recommended that staff be sufficiently trained, ambulance drivers and call centre staff be hired, roads be created to ensure access to communities, that the ambulance fleet be increased and that the department provide suitable vehicles for all kinds of terrain in the province.
Community healthcare worker Nomalinge James said as someone who worked in the system in Peddie, there was still a major shortage of staff, ambulances and clinic drugs.
“Even now there is no insulin at Nier Clinic in Peddie,” she said, adding that there were other chronic drugs that were also out of stock.
Marongo said there had not been any significant improvement since alerting the department to how dire things were on the ground.
“There seems to be no political will to ensure radical change in the system, possibly because there has been no legal intervention in the past four years,” he said.
Marongo said the coalition invited the department to last Friday’s summit to observe – but the department did not attend.
Provincial health head Dr Thobile Mbengashe said no formal invitation had been received. He said there were changes, some tangible and others in the pipeline. Following the SAHRC report, their ambulance fleet and staff had increased.
Mbengashe said they had also catered for tough terrain.
He said they were mindful of patient satisfaction and were working to ensure this through the national core standards and other strategies such as ensuring no more stock outs, and fully stocked cleaning material, sufficient food and equipment.
“All those things really made a difference in how services are delivered,” Mbengashe said.
“It’s an ongoing thing and there will be glitches here and there and we encourage the public to raise issues with us through the available channels and we do respond to these.”
No political will to treat sick health system, NGO says
Testifying of their experiences in the system, they claimed there had been little or no change in the past four years.
Four years ago, a coalition of non-government organisations came together to form the Eastern Cape Health Crisis Action Coalition to fight for the rights of the people of the province.
Coalition spokesman Mluleki Marongo said they had been looking at the emergency medical services (EMS) crisis, human resource challenges and “the general decay and failure of the healthcare system”.
Last October, the South African Human Rights Commission (SAHRC) launched a report into the EMS challenges in the province.
They recommended that staff be sufficiently trained, ambulance drivers and call centre staff be hired, roads be created to ensure access to communities, that the ambulance fleet be increased and that the department provide suitable vehicles for all kinds of terrain in the province.
Community healthcare worker Nomalinge James said as someone who worked in the system in Peddie, there was still a major shortage of staff, ambulances and clinic drugs.
“Even now there is no insulin at Nier Clinic in Peddie,” she said, adding that there were other chronic drugs that were also out of stock.
Marongo said there had not been any significant improvement since alerting the department to how dire things were on the ground.
“There seems to be no political will to ensure radical change in the system, possibly because there has been no legal intervention in the past four years,” he said.
Marongo said the coalition invited the department to last Friday’s summit to observe – but the department did not attend.
Provincial health head Dr Thobile Mbengashe said no formal invitation had been received. He said there were changes, some tangible and others in the pipeline. Following the SAHRC report, their ambulance fleet and staff had increased.
Mbengashe said they had also catered for tough terrain.
He said they were mindful of patient satisfaction and were working to ensure this through the national core standards and other strategies such as ensuring no more stock outs, and fully stocked cleaning material, sufficient food and equipment.
“All those things really made a difference in how services are delivered,” Mbengashe said.
“It’s an ongoing thing and there will be glitches here and there and we encourage the public to raise issues with us through the available channels and we do respond to these.”
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