Gauteng MEC for Health Bandile Masuku says the government’s National Health Insurance (NHI) proposal is ‘an opportunity to step up the rainbow nation rhetoric through actionable commitments towards health justice’.
Masuku said in a statement: ‘The NHI firstly offers the opportunity to close the economic disparity that exists in access to healthcare services in the country. It is in part, an appeal to the moral duty and conscience of South Africans genuinely committed to equality and justice. It is also an opportunity to step up the rainbow nation rhetoric through actionable commitments towards health justice.
‘Secondly, the NHI echoes the view that radical transformation cannot take place in a business as usual context, it is the business of radicalism to challenge the way in which the market operates. In the health sector, there is evidence that the private sector works in an unequal, and unsustainable way that not only excludes the majority, but that also exploits even those that are included.
‘A business as usual approach on the political economy of health will not radically transform the socio-economic positions of most of the people in South Africa.’
He added: ‘The reality that the private sector remains an oligopoly itself is a case for transformation of the sector. Lastly, the NHI as presented prioritises an approach that empowers the health user to take full responsibility of their health.’