Pretoria – Stakeholders in the health industry have welcomed the progress the country has made in fighting HIV and AIDS.
Delivering his last State of the Nation Address (SONA) for the current administration on Thursday, President Jacob Zuma highlighted the milestones achieved in the health system, which have led to millions of people benefitting from improved access to treatment.
“We can confirm and guaranteed that post 1994, the child mortality rate has gone down, and this is due to government’s programme on HIV and AIDS. Unlike in the past, when it meant a death sentence, mothers now understand that even if they are HIV positive, they can give birth to healthy babies, who are of free of HIV,” said South African Medical Association (SAMA) President, Dr Phophi Ramathuba.
While Ramathuba acknowledged that the country still had a long way to go to fight HIV, she said SAMA was proud of the turnaround, adding that the programme management and treatment were very effective.
Zuma highlighted the milestones made by the country’s ARV programme, including the sharp decline in the mother-to-child HIV transmission rate.
South Africa has doubled the number of people who are receiving anti-retroviral treatment, from one million to 2.4 million people in 2013.
More than 20 million South Africans have taken the HIV test since the launch of the HIV, Counselling and Testing (HCT) in 2010. This, the President said, indicated confidence in the health system.
Zuma said the turnaround in the HIV and AIDS programme was one of the biggest achievements of this administration, and the country was being used as a model by the United Nations Aids Programmes (UNAIDS).
The Democratic Nursing Organisation of South Africa (Denosa) agreed that great strides have been made in the country against the HIV/AIDS pandemic.
“It’s certainly a story of victory that the country must be proud of, which has now become model to copy by other countries. We are particularly happy as a nursing organisation because this programme has been led by nurses through the nurse-initiated Management of Antiretroviral Therapy (NIMART), which has empowered nurses -- who are the majority of health professionals -- to be at the forefront of dispensing and treating patients in this regard,” said Denosa spokesperson, Sibongiseni Delihlazo.
However, Delihlazo said there were more challenges that needed to be addressed as a matter of urgency if the country is to make even greater strides in improving the health of its citizens.
These challenges include, amongst others, employment of more nurses in both rural and urban areas, where nurse-to-patient ratios are uncomfortably high; long queues in health facilities; burn-out for current staff complements as a result of a heavy workload on them and demoralization on the part of health workers as a result of these.
“There is a need for a forward-looking and proper HR planning by provincial departments so that nurses who are qualified are absorbed into the public service as a matter of urgency, so that we avoid taking up to a year before a nurse is hired or gets replaced,” said Delihlazo.
NHI
Whilst welcoming the improvements in the building of 300 new health facilities, Ramathuba emphasised the need for the building of academic hospitals, especially in Limpopo, amongst other provinces. She said they would have liked to get more information on the implementation of the National Health Insurance (NHI).
“The primary health care can’t cope with the burden of disease. We need to have district hospitals in every sub-district, as well as academic hospitals in other provinces. This is important for NHI and if we implement it well, we can improve accessibility,” Ramathuba told SAnews. – SAnews.gov.za
