Pablo

The long quote, which is all this article consists of, is hardly from a disinterested observer. I think I'll stick to what I'm hearing from South African doctors, thank you.

Pablo

stormer

Having read your previous ranting this does not surprise me.

Sweet Chilli

From my own personal experience I would tend to believe the quotes Stormer has provided. If it were not for the competence, speed and professionalism of the private hospital my father-in-law was admitted to in Jo'burg while having a major heart-attack he would not be around today. The care and major operation he underwent after the heart-attack were first class. I do not hold the same high regard for the NHS of which I also have experience.

Pablo

My doctor in Johannesburg (my ex doctor) had a heart attack in 2001. He then found out he needed a quintuple bypass, which he had at a private clinic in Jo'burg with a doctor of his own choosing - a doctor he knew and trusted, and, since my doctor was a qualified surgeon, he knew what he was talking about when it came to surgery.

While recovering in Intensive Care, he was mistakenly identfied as someone *awaiting* an operation, and was about to be wheeled off, but fortunately he was conscious, and managed to prevent this happening.

After that he checked himself out and had a whole intensive care thing set up in his own home. He told me later that the only place he'd go for treatment was the Garden City Clinic. That was 2001. Things may have changed.

But if things are really so hunky dory, one wonders why Manto the health minister is coming to the UK to try to persuade SA nurses and doctors to return.

It was reported a few months ago that the medical school at the U. of Cape Town were dropping the standard for black medical students, because not enough of them were qualifying. If this report is true, it is also a cause for concern.

The thing about health care is that most people don't have much to do with it. Unless you work in the system, or know people who do, you don't get to hear what's really going on.

It's like those people in the UK who have one good experience with the NHS and think that as a result of that one good experience the whole NHS is absolutely fine and faultless.

Pablo

G'Day

Many of my friends and several of my family members work in the SA health care system and they are appalled at it. They are doctors, nurses, specialists and all have quite a bit to say about the health care in RSA, and none of it is complimentary. Many of them are in the process of immigrating already and many more would immigrate tomorrow if they did not have situations at home that prevented them from leaving (e.g. family, finances etc.)

Yes, SA has some of the most innovative and excellent medical specialists in the world, but for how long will that prevail with a gov that doesn't care about standards or science?

G'Day

Stormer you are obviously on a mission here and neither realistic nor unbiased. Those of us who have immigrated have lived both sides of this argument and actually have a bit of first-hand knowledge to back up what we post. All you have is emotional ravings and other people's opinions.

Please get some facts because you are starting to look really silly.

stormer

And are you are entirely innocent of the same charge? Your patronizing post deserve nothing but contempt they get from me. Same goes for few other posters on the site.
I 'm afraid that your confidence is inspired either by ignorance or arrogance, or both.

sa2oz

Stormer. I amintruiged to known what brings you to this group of forums full of all us ignorant expat South Africans feeling sorry for our selves. Please enlighten me. perhaps like most of us who joined, a desire to leave there?

Piccolo

QWhy does no one on these forums discuss why you now have a medical crises in SA. At the end of apartheid, medical services became more readily available to the masses probably overwhelmong the system. Medical staff moved to the Arab States for huge salaries. I met many in Saudi.

HIV and Aids related illnesses cause a drain on Government funding. As more and more staff leave of course the conditions get worse for those who stay.

Training of black doctors? How many did SA have before 1990? Other African countries have had African doctors for many years. Lowering of standards is probably only done at admission level as many will be lacking
the necessary sciences needed. Clinical Officers ( between nurse level and doctors) can be trained and can help with the work load.

Of course the mediacal services will not be what most of the white population were used to but at least now it is available to more people.

Pablo

What you say is partly right. It is true, as you say, that people are emigrating. People do, in a free country.

Furthermore, while it is understandable that the SA government wants to increase medical coverage in the remote bush areas, forcing newly trained doctors and nurses to spend a year or two working in those places is proving to be counterproductive, just as was predicted.

It doesn't help either that the government is playing political race games with the medical system, as they are now doing with the education system.

But worst of all must be the SA government's attitude to Aids treatment. For absurd reasons of black racial pride and other nonsense, the government has remained in denial precisely at the time when it could have taken effective measures to combat the spread of hiv. And now, even with free or virtually free hiv drugs, the government is not able - and some say not willing - to combat this *holocaust*.

The levels of hiv positive South Africans are now so high that it is questionable whether any country - even a First World country - could cope without a massive redirection of resources. Have you seen the numbers? And while these numbers of hiv+ victims has grown and grown, the government has sat idly by arguing that hiv doesn't cause Aids.

In short, while I acknowledge the problem is multifaceted, the core problem is political. It is caused by the government's policies, or its complacency, and will not be solved without changes.

As for the lowering of admission standards for trainee doctors, your point may be right if those same doctors will be failed at the end of their courses if they don't make the grade. And it may be that that will happen. However, elsewhere in SA, in other areas of expertise, what we see is that, once these people are in the education system, there is huge pressure *not* to fail them - especially if the majority of failures happen to be black. So it becomes easier for the universities, and for the government, if they are passed, even if they are not up to standard.

On that last question we shall see. If the West stops recognising that a SA medical qualification is as good as, say, a UK one, then we will have an indication that standards are slipping.

Pablo

G'Day

I agree that health services are overwhelmed. I disagree that it was to be expected because the gov has known about the situation for a long time yet does nothing to turn the tide.

An example; My friend is a Dr in a small town 400km from nowhere. She used to work for the gov also, because there were not really enough paying patients to keep her business affloat. So afternoons she would go to the local clinic. She also had a pharmacy adjacent to her practice, the only one in a 400km radius, this helped her survive as well. Many times, when money to fund medicine in the hospital "vanished" into some official's pocket, she supplied medicine, freely, from her own supplies. Then the gov decided they were no longer paying her for her clinic & hospital services, but she still went to the hospital and clinic and helped those who could not afford her services. Then the gov decided that she could no longer sell medicine, and she could no longer make a living in that small town and had to move away. Now people have to drive 400km to see a Dr and get a prescription and meds. 80% of this town's population lives below the breadline and cannot afford such transport or the costs involved in the whole procedure. The people who treat them now are nurses, armed with textbooks & trying to make Dr's diagniosis and hoping they don't kill someone in the process. How did this show the gov's dedication to providing a basic health service to this area?

Nurses and Drs are leaving in droves (even black nurses & Drs) because they did not spend 7 years studying & racking up huge study debts to starve. You would not stand for that kind of government abuse either, why should they?

And then let's not even go into detail about gov corruption and how in some clinics nurses had to bring Panadol from home to give to their patients because their cupboards were bare. And the stress of working with HIV patients and knowing the smallest mistake could be your last! All the while Mbeki is yelling that anti-retrovirals are "A complot by the whites to poison blacks" and he's putting Drs in jail who prescribe it, yet he and his cabinet & their families have free access to these drugs!

And corruption. You do not know what it is like to get a budget on paper and then to find out that the money has been stolen, year after year. And no-one seems to know where it has gone and no-one is giving you more money because there is no more to give you! I worked for a gov funded foodscheme and for the two years I worked there we and the good people of our town fed those children. Every year we'd get money from the gov, on paper, but we'd never see that money in the bank.

Personally I don't think the gov in RSA cares about the people. They are politicians and for them it's about the attaining of power & the keeping of power. Look how quickly the NATS and the ANC jumped into bed together when it suited them? Bitter enemies become loyal friends when there's power to be had along with nice cars, jets and a great salary with benefits. Probably the only people in SA who will be able to survive on their gov pension are these politicians.