Limpopo’s cancer patients are waiting, on average, for a year before they can get vital radiation therapy, a sign of the immense pressure facing the province’s health department, Parliament heard on Wednesday. In a frank presentation to Parliament’s health portfolio committee, Limpopo health MEC Poppy Ramathuba described how chronic budget pressures, staff shortages, and dilapidated equipment were compromising patient care. The Limpopo health department received a qualified audit from the Auditor-General in 2016-17, despite reductions in its wasteful and irregular expenditure. It began the 2018-19 fiscal year with accruals of R1.09bn and R739m in outstanding employee benefits, against a budget allocation of R19.5bn for the period. About 40% of the accruals were due to over-spending on the R863m budget allocation for medicines in 2017-18, due in part to a sudden surge in the price of some essential medicines, said Ramathuba. For example, the price of the malaria drug artesunate more ...
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