Confusion Surrounding Proposed National Health Insurance

September 21 - While the South African government may have plans to introduce a National Health Insurance scheme that it promises will change the face of healthcare in the country, there is still no concrete information regarding its format.

The scheme has been veiled in secrecy since it was first mentioned by the ANC government, although authorities insist that it will provide universal accessibility to affordable care for all residents of the country.

The scheme was meant to be tabled by cabinet earlier this year and brought into public domain, however, nothing of the sort has happened and analysts are slamming the government for dragging its heels and keeping information from the public.

"No one knows where the process is right now," said Samson Mkhokheli, a South African health economist.

Other groups have commissioned consultancy groups to try and estimate a realistic cost of a proposed NHI scheme, such as Econex which showed that the ANC government would have to find up to R244 billion EXTRA a year to finance a scheme of such proportions.

However, the government has rejected these estimates and said that "we have not gotten to the budgeting stage yet, and we do not know what the projections are based on."

While political parties, especially the opposition are calling for the government to take a step back and listen to what the experts are saying, the government insists that a process is in progress and that a policy already exists for the implementation of the plan.

"There was a slight delay when the Cabinet commissions queries some aspects of the document submitted to them by the NHI ministerial advisory committee," said national Department of Health spokesperson Fidel Radeba. "Once they are satisfied it will go to the full Cabinet, then to the public for consultation."