South Africa is losing more medical practitioners as they land jobs abroad, attracted by better pay and working conditions, and the NHI isn’t the only reason.
There are no readily available statistics, but a 2019 study published in the Human Resources for Health journal concluded that of 497 medical graduates, 89% (444) were still working here while 6.8% (34) had emigrated.
Dr Piema Lobo, the head of pharmaceutical and clinical management at the Far East Rand Hospital in Springs – an NHI pilot hospital – said health practitioners were being offered ‘life-changing opportunities, especially unemployed doctors’.
Most doctors were being recruited through social media and online professional companies.
Local doctors have an advantage, having trained in English, and South Africa has world-class accreditation. Lobo said: ‘You don’t even have to apply [for a job]; they headhunt you. After you have seen that package [offered], the rest is history’.
Here long hours and low salaries are exacerbated by high patient volumes, broken infrastructure, no resources, criminality, and old equipment.
Another doctor, Dr Sonwabo Lindani, said doctors have less family time compared with their counterparts in Canada, the UK and Australia.
The public hospitals have not been able to hire more than 800 qualified doctors to fill the posts because of budget constraints, according to the South African Medical Association Trade Union.
National health spokesperson Foster Mohale has attributed the threat to leave as ‘simply because of efforts [NHI] by government to ensure equal access to quality and affordable health services’.