Wednesday, 6 December 2023

1. The SACP unequivocally denounces the profit-driven private healthcare sector manoeuvres to obstruct the adoption of the National Health Insurance (NHI) Bill. Their aim has been to prevent the advance to quality healthcare for all—universal healthcare coverage—or to dilute NHI legislation so that, by the time of its implementation, it will not even be a shadow of what it should have been.
2. We are disappointed that the profit-driven interests from the private healthcare sector succeeded in establishing their influence, which we suspect contributed to the postponement of the National Council of Provinces’ sitting that was scheduled to pass the NHI Bill last week to December the 6^th.
3. Like under corporate capture of the state, profit-driven interests from the private sector do not work alone. They built a toxic nexus with capturable public (mis-)representatives and officials who were willing to be at their service. The SACP condemns all forms of state capture in the strongest terms of possible.
4. We reject the notion by profit-driven interests that consultation on the NHI Bill was insufficient. After over 15 years, since the NHI discourse first entered the national agenda, there is no time for delay, but a need to move forward promptly.
5. We appreciate the extensive public consultation that has showed overwhelming support for the NHI Bill. The will of the people, the majority of whom are the workers and poor who are excluded by profit-driven interests in the private healthcare sector, must be respected.
6. Therefore, the National Council of Provinces must, today, pass the NHI Bill. This must be followed by its proclamation by the President as an Act of Parliament, paving the way for full implementation of the NHI towards quality universal healthcare coverage. 
7. The SACP reaffirms its unwavering support for the NHI, which must be a stride towards quality universal healthcare coverage. To achieve this, as the people said during the extensive consultative process that has taken place, the NHI Bill must give effect to the key principles of equality in healthcare provision, without regard to a person’s class position, class location and income and wealth status. This requires an NHI Fund, which the NHI Bill provides for, and which must guarantee comprehensive quality healthcare coverage—based on free access.
8. Private medical aid schemes, for those who still wish to subscribe to these schemes, should be secondary, covering additional services beyond what the NHI Fund covers.
9. We support the NHI funding that must be rooted in the principle of social solidarity, with a commitment to redistribute more from the surplus that the wealthy appropriate from the economy.
10. The NHI emphasis on the development of primary healthcare, a move aimed at unifying the healthcare system, should remain a pivotal aspect.
11. It is disgusting and unjust that South Africa’s current healthcare system is marred by disparities, with the profit-driven private sector, dominated by three hospital oligopolies, Netcare, Mediclinic and Life, concentrating the majority of health funding but catering to a privileged minority. The grossly under-funded public health sector serves the majority. These disparities have resulted in stark health inequalities. The under-funded public healthcare sector is overloaded, with many patients waiting on long queues—and others even end up dying without seeing treatment. It must be the historical mission of the NHI to bring this to an end. The public healthcare sector should be funded adequately, fully equipped and thus upgraded to serve as the mainstay of the NHI.
12. The core principles of the NHI, including treating healthcare as a constitutional right, universal healthcare coverage, social solidarity, and a publicly administered NHI fund, resonate with the goal of equality in healthcare.
13. The SACP firmly rejects manoeuvres that seek to reinforce the dominance of medical aid schemes and profit-driven healthcare interests. To be sure, today there are too many people who have a medical aid cover, but which becomes useless—as the finance interests who design medical aid scheme benefits curtail those benefits to be exhausted—mostly around mid-year. This is because medical aid schemes are financialised: they have more to do with the finance capital interests raking in profits than they have to do with actively supporting day-to-day healthcare.