AZAPO - Azanian People's Organisation

Sue Grafton observes that: “If high heels were so wonderful, men would be wearing them.” Indeed!

Historically, men have been very prominent in the design and making of shoes. It is self evident that men design, make and sell millions of pairs of high heel shoes in their many factories and stores throughout the world. But men don’t wear high heel shoes. They make them for women.

You see, high heels are not good for your health. They are bad for your back, feet and are not suited for running, carrying and general mobility associated with work.

The announcement recently by the two medical doctors heading the health department as minister and deputy minister, namely, Motsoaledi and Sefularo, must have sounded like music in the ears of the long suffering patients in our country.

Many visit some of our public hospitals and clinics with trepidation. Others have been heard describing some of these health facilities as death traps. Frequent horror stories in the media about the poor state and performance of many of these health facilities have gone on for so long that most of us are now desensitized.

The initiative by the health department is geared at tackling some of the ills facing public health facilities across the country. Like high heels, many public hospitals and clinics, might not, as things stand presently, be good for our health.

Although the plan sounds very good on paper, most of us would hope that things would improve so much that the makers of the high heels would not only tell us how great the shoes are, but they themselves would wear them with pride.

The citizens of this country would incline to believe in the efficacy of the public sector health system if it is patronized by those who lead and work the system. When the ministers, MECs, senior officials, doctors, nurses working in our public health facilities and their families use these facilities whenever they need medical care, we would know that they have confidence in the system they control.

What are you telling us when you run our public health system but when you or your loved ones are ill, go to the private sector?

The case of a senior official in the health department in Limpopo comes to mind. He was well known for extolling the virtues of public health facilities in the province. But when his wife suddenly fell ill, he rushed her to a private hospital, not the nearest public hospital he had tried so much to sell to the citizens of the province.

Owners of private clinics and hospitals, and the health professionals they employ, use those facilities themselves. That is a vote of confidence in the facilities and the professionals who work there.

The initiative by the health department seeks to improve the attitude of health staff in our clinics and hospitals; reduce patient queues; drastically improve cleanliness; reduce or eliminate infection rates in our clinics and hospitals; ensure adequate supplies of medicines and equipment, and generally give patients a better service.

Health workers in our country are trained and accredited by the same institutions, which means that their competence is the same. The difference in performance or patient satisfaction boils down to work environment, administration, equipment, attitude and remuneration.

Obviously, these factors have a huge impact on one another. Bad administration, for example, would foul the work environment, dent the moral of the workers and provide inept support to the workers in terms of equipment and medicaments. It is not inconceivable that a lot of the problems experienced in the public health sector are attributable mainly to bad leadership at institutional level.

It would seem therefore, that the success of this wonderful initiative would be immensely enhanced by the appointment of qualified and competent people to run our hospitals and clinics.

As AZAPO has observed quite often in the immediate past, our country does have capable people. The problem has been the appointment of people into positions of responsibility, most on the basis of political or other connectivity, as opposed to ability and suitability. As a result, we have a lot of square pegs sitting awkwardly in round holes all over the country.

It is not only our institutions that suffer when this happens, but also the citizens who are supposed to be served by the entity concerned. But more often than not, we also hurt the individuals who are so employed in jobs they are ill-equipped to perform. Quite often they end up in scandals or messy dismissals.

The initiative does not seem to put much emphasis on adequate staffing of our health facilities with enough doctors, nurses and other such professionals. Overstretched and overworked personnel cannot shorten queues and generally deliver efficient service to the public.

This plan deserves lots of wind under its wings and we hope it would be so successful that its initiators will easily find it their “shoes” of choice.

�by Tshobz @ 15 Dec 2009 12:55 pm

From the country's president to the poorest who stays emikhukhwini, if and when we all use the same institutions thats only when we will have same standards across all these institutions.Could not have said it better myself Cde Mangena..!!! Aita Azapo President.!