South Africa’s biggest medical aids argue for their right to exist under the NHI

Major private medical aids back the objectives of the National Health Insurance Bill and the concept of universal healthcare – but take serious issue with the government’s plans and intentions in executing these goals.

The government maintains that the NHI won’t kill private healthcare, but it has conceded that room for medical aids will be significantly reduced, as these schemes will only be able to exist to fund services not covered by the NHI.The role of private healthcare and medical aids is emerging as a big sticking point for the NHI, as is the topic of funding – which the state has openly admitted will require more taxes on South Africans.

Currently, there are roughly 51 million South Africans that are required to use public healthcare, whereas 9 million people are administered by private companies. Momentum suggested that introducing affordable health insurance from the private sector would alleviate pressure on public healthcare facilities, arguing that the private sector doesn’t need to be eliminated to implement the National Health Insurance system., Damian McHugh, the head of marketing for the company, believes that there are incremental steps that can be made to improve public health services, “and we think the private sector should own some of those”.

Lee Callakoppen, the principal officer at the company, said that critics of the NHI often do not object to the concept of Universal Healthcare but rather object to the inherent flaws within the bill. “Bonitas does not resist the reasoning behind the Bill in principle and agree with the notion that the right of access to quality, healthcare services in South Africa, is currently disproportionate.”

Source: Healthcare Press (healthcarepress.net)

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