LETTER: Better the devil you know than NHI

It saddens me to note just how gullible the poor and downtrodden of our society are. Easily deceived, and after many years of unfulfilled empty promises that have left them more destitute than they ever have been, they are still hopeful that something good might materialise from the implementation of NHI.

There will be no health services just a few months after the implementation of NHI, much as happened in Zimbabwe after the late former president Robert Mugabe introduced Health for All in in 1992. That is why SA has been providing healthcare services for Zimbabweans for years.

This is despite all the horror stories in our newspapers about the state of our healthcare services. Just recently, we learnt how patients were starved in the first six months of this year in 26 of the 34 public hospitals in Gauteng. Then we learnt that 706 nurses had their contracts terminated in Limpopo for lack of funding.

It is unfair for government to take advantage of the ignorance and desperation of the poor, who are forever hoping for free services from government, even though by now they should have learnt from experience that most things promised to them proved to be nothing but empty promises. Their lives have become harder and the suffering more unbearable.

The health services that continue to be subsidised by government for everyone in public hospitals since centuries ago were the best until the present government took over, changing everything, resulting in all the hardships facing our health system today.

If we are to be honest, the devil you know is better than the devil you don’t know. Don’t gamble with the lives of our nation.

The overcrowding in all our health facilities is overstretching our meagre resources because of this government’s open border system. What we see today will be like a Sunday picnic once NHI is implemented. Don’t ask for more trouble than we already have.

Cometh Dube-Makholwa,
Midrand