Gauteng is SA’s economic heartland, generating a third of the country’s GDP and home to more than a quarter of its population. It gets the biggest public healthcare budget in the country, at almost R65bn, and is graced with two medical schools and 37 public hospitals, including Chris Hani Baragwanath, the largest hospital in Africa. With all these resources at its disposal, the province should be leading the way in the provision of healthcare. Yet it lurches from one crisis to the next, with tragic consequences for patients.
The latest horror to hit the headlines is the lethal wait confronting cancer patients who need radiation therapy, which is used to kill remaining cancer cells after surgery and helps prevent cancer returning. A delay in the provision of radiation therapy is no small thing; patients suffer and die. Yet an estimated 3,000 patients are now waiting for radiation therapy in Gauteng, with tragic consequences.
In 2023, Gauteng’s then MEC for finance, Jacob Mamabolo, promised in his budget speech for the 2023/24 fiscal year that the surgical and radiation oncology backlog would be urgently tackled, announcing that an extra R784m had been set aside over the medium term for this purpose. Yet more than a year later, nothing has changed for the patients on the backlog list.
It took six months for the Gauteng health department to issue a call for bids for three tenders for the provision of services. To date only one of the contracts has been awarded. No new equipment has been purchased and no extra hands hired.
In desperation, the Cancer Alliance has turned to the courts to try to compel the Gauteng health department to devise a credible plan for expanding radiation oncology services and to spend the money it has been given. Its court papers include testimony from breast cancer patients who describe how their disease has progressed as they waited in vain, year after year, for radiation therapy. This is treatment that government guidelines say should be provided within 60 days, 90 at most.
The response from the department is telling. Instead of expressing compassion for patients, it has accused them of lying under oath and accused the Cancer Alliance of ulterior motives, saying its action is driven by its preferred service provider not getting the tender.
Given the department’s history of weak leadership and corruption, it’s impossible to know whether its glacial response to the plight of cancer patients is due to malfeasance or sheer incompetence. This is a fundamentally unstable department that rarely sees its top managers hold their positions for more than a year or two, and those who endure are frequently embroiled in scandals. Its acting head of department, Arnold Malotana, has been implicated in a tender-rigging scheme now being investigated by the Hawks. CFO Lerato Madyo was allegedly involved in the Thembisa hospital corruption scheme and has been on suspension for almost two years, and its head of corporate services, Basani Baloyi, remains in her job despite the Public Service Commission’s finding that her appointment was irregular.
Any hopes of a new broom coming in to sweep away the decay and inject a fresh sense of urgency into the provincial health department were dashed when premier Panyaza Lesufi formed a minority government without the DA, effectively leaving the ANC’s network of power and patronage untouched. The ANC at national level has chosen to turn a blind eye to his actions, with tragic consequences for patients.
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