Hon Chairperson, hon Minister, hon Deputy Minister, hon Members of Parliament, distinguished guests in the gallery, and ladies and gentlemen, the ANC believes that we are on course towards improving the health profile of all South Africans. At the most basic level, health is a fundamental human right.
The Universal Declaration of Human Rights proclaims that everyone has the right to access the service required to live a healthy life, with mothers and children being entitled to special care and assistance. Besides the moral and ethical case for saving women and children, there are strong social and economic justifications for investing in maternal health. The link between health, long-term economic growth and poverty reduction is much more powerful than it is generally understood.
Primary health care is at the heart of the plans to transform health services in South Africa. An integrated package of essential primary health care service that is available to the entire population will provide the solid foundations of a single, unified health system. There is no way that the efficiency and effectiveness of the health care system can ever be realised without dealing with the cost of health care and health care financing.
There are people who wrongly believe that the concept of health care financing, as envisaged in National Health Insurance, is a pipe dream concocted by the ANC. While there is still a lot more to be done, we are proud of our achievements to date in primary health care. In eradicating institutional racism, our country is a model of democracy and human rights. It is because of these successes that since 1994 we were able to move from the second phase of our transition. The National Development Plan provides us with the vision and road map to confront these socioeconomic challenges facing our people. To expect that the challenges that confront us as a nation would have been eradicated in only 19 years would be to deny the existence of an extraordinary human disaster that lasted for far too long.
Whenever I stand before this august House to respond to the speech of the Minister of Health, Dr Aaron Motsoaledi, I get enthused by the manner in which he takes on his work under the guidance of the ANC. Through him, the ANC government has made leadership of the health system so simple for all people to understand and to have passion for. The ANC government makes work of leading the health sector very simple and do-able.
Having said that, we need to remind the department that much still needs to be done. Having done what they did, all that remains to be done will be achieved in our lifetime. There are still people who have to walk a few kilometres to access health care. There are still facilities that do not operate 24 hours, more especially in the Western Cape. There are facilities at which patients wait for a long period before receiving care. There are still reports of a lack of medication in facilities, with some reports showing that our staff members are rude to patients. These things must continue to keep us awake at night. However, we are hopeful that we will address them because as people know, Rome wasn't built in a day.
Allow me to reflect on what I have observed about this department since I became a member of this committee in 2009. All of us would remember where this Minister, after being deployed by the ANC, took the department from. When he first opened his mouth in May 2009, many people must have thought; here comes a dreamer. Little did they know that there was a steamroller and a caterpillar coming, which was going to move health care to the road of no return. With what this Minister has done, health care will never be the same again.
Those who thought that the ANC government was dreaming were made to eat humble pie as they watched the department moving from one success to another. There are some who may have thought that the first success was a fluke, but when the next plan became a success and the next as well - when they could not count them any more - they realised that these were steps in the right direction.
The ANC government went on a path for the transformation of the health sector. In this way, the department has indentified key pillars of the health system which need attention. Allow me to take a few of those pillars and reflect on how we have watched the department perform under each.
As members would know, when the fish rots, it rots from the head down. The department realised that in order to correct the ills of the hospitals, there had to be some work done to improve the performance of its chief executive officers. The department did an assessment of CEOs of the hospitals in the public health sector to see if the right people were appointed for the right jobs. The results pointed in a particular direction that confirmed some of the suspicions.
The department did not hesitate to follow the direction that the assessment was showing. They swiftly went on to advertise the posts of CEOs in hospitals; proceeded with the selection process; issued appointment letters; conducted inductions of the CEOs; and then sent them out into the field to do the job. We do accept that this was not an easy road and that there were some areas that needed to be finalised. However, we are happy that the first move has been made. This is actually a sizeable step in the right direction that deserves praise.
Seeing that the foundation of health care was having serious problems, the department ordered an audit of health facilities. The outcomes of the audit confirmed that there were serious problems that needed to be sorted out sooner rather than later. The results will assist the department to be more targeted in its intervention.
Facility improvement teams were established in anticipation of the outcomes of the facility audits. The teams have been allocated to focus on the districts, with a special focus on the areas of weaknesses identified during the audits.
The transformation of the health care system is never complete until an ordinary person has access to health services irrespective of their ability to pay. Both the health facility audits and facility improvement teams were meant to support the implementation of National Health Insurance. This is the programme that clearly divides South Africans into pro-rich on the one side and the pro-poor on the other. I am tempted to put the pro-rich on the right and the pro-poor on the left, because naturally that is where they both belong.
The pro-rich have been critical of National Health Insurance, because for them life is normal when the rich are healthy and the poor unhealthy; when the rich have access to services and the poor no access; when the rich are treated in a first-class setting and the poor in a second-class setting. That is the society they want, whereas the pro-poor on the other side want everything for everybody so that nobody suffers simply because of the size of their purse.
The NHI is seen by some as key to unlocking the gates that are blocking access to services. Some of us that come from and still live in rural areas look to NHI for a solution to the problems of the health care system. This is a system that is geared towards the poor. Because the government is pro- poor, it will ensure that the poor that voted the government into power receive good care so that they can live long and healthy lives. [Applause.] Without access to health care, a long and healthy life becomes a pipe dream, so the department wants to move a dream to reality, move from concepts to implementation, from theory to practice.
The department went on an uncharted road of re-engineering primary health care. This process succeeded in three main areas, which were made public to the people of South Africa: The launch of school health services which was officiated by the number one citizen of this country, President Jacob Zuma, in October 2012; and the establishment of ward-based primary health care outreach teams with a focus on NHI pilot districts. The department has established these teams in an effort to streamline community-based health intervention.
The department appointed district clinical specialists in all nine provinces. These programmes had some problems, but the committee is excited that this is a move in the right direction. We would like to congratulate the department on its bravery and steadfastness, as well as on its resoluteness in pursuing the goal of improving the lives of South Africans.
We all know that health care is a labour-intensive sector. In this area, the department worked with the deans of medical schools to increase the intake of medical students. This was supported by the increase in the number of students that were sent to Cuba for medical training. I am of the view that the department did well, despite media reports about some of the students that were on strike in Cuba. The department also moved swiftly to deal with that situation.
The department brought about the National Health Amendment Bill, which was debated by the House. This is a piece of legislation that will surely contribute towards taking the transformation of health care to a new level. It is my wish and hope that the office that will be established in line with the Act will contribute towards improving the conditions in which our people are treated. It will help in improving the quality of health care. We know that the office that is to be established will be an added resource outside the department to help improve the situation in our public health facilities.
The ANC government responded in the most appropriate way to the need to accelerate performance towards the attainment of the Millennium Development Goals, by launching the Campaign on Accelerated Reduction of Maternal Mortality, Carmma. This launch, once again, was a sign that the department is more concerned with the unwarranted and preventable causes of death of mothers during and around pregnancy. When the department invited this committee to the launch, there was an overwhelming feeling that indeed there was commitment to attaining the plans as outlined in the negotiated service delivery agreement and the MDGs. This is testimony to the fact that the lives of our mothers are valued and taken seriously, because, honestly, it is a shame for a woman to die simply because she fell pregnant.
Ntetle ke re go Lefapha la Pholo, nko ya kgomo mogala tshwara thata e se re go utlwa sebodu, wa kgaoga. [The Department of Health must keep up its good performance, and must not be complacent.]
This is simply translated in Afrikaans as "hou vas", and in English as hold tight. This is so right in that we do not want you to be complacent because our people still need more health services. The mothers need vaccines, which, by the way, we are doing very well in terms of immunisation coverage. The old people still need their chronic medication, and people with disabilities still need assistive devices. The goals you have scored must spur you to greater heights and serve as a motivation to do more. The ANC supports the Vote. [Time expired.] [Applause.]