EDITORIAL: Physician, heal your myopia
Minister Motsoaledi has been long on promise, short on detail and inconsistent in his position
Health Minister Aaron Motsoaledi appears determined to show delegates to the ANC policy conference in June that he’s made progress in implementing National Health Insurance (NHI). But what his latest position is on this game-changing policy remains anyone’s guess. The noble goal of NHI is to provide everyone with health services that are free at the point of delivery, but so far, the minister has been long on promise, short on detail and inconsistent in his position. One moment he and his director-general are signalling a softer and more rational approach to medical schemes than the NHI white paper’s hard-line view that they should be relegated to merely providing complementary cover. The next he’s standing up in Parliament and fending off an attack from trade union federation Cosatu by insisting he hasn’t sold out to the private sector. The minister may be struggling to find common ground with Cosatu on NHI, but in one area, they are bizarrely united: both parties readily turn to i...
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