Mediclinic was certain that its private hospitals would retain their profitability despite the introduction of the National Health Insurance (NHI) scheme, the private hospital group said last week.
Roly Buys, the funder relations and contracting executive for Mediclinic, said at an industry affairs media forum on Friday: “The public sector needs additional beds, we can develop that capacity, which will actually enhance our volumes.”
Mediclinic’s chief financial officer, Braam Joubert, said the group had plans to assist the NHI in capacity creation. It had budgeted a capital expenditure (capex) of R400 million a year to expand its existing hospitals and build one or two during the first phase of the NHI rollout.
The group’s chief executive, Koert Pretorius, said he could not imagine South Africa without the private health-care sector and the NHI’s proposition to include this sector as a significant role player was a sound one.
“There’s a lot of good work done by the minister and the department. It’s a practical philosophy and their objectives are very sound,” he said.
Buys said the NHI green paper had given an idea of the Health Department’s conceptual thinking for the first time.
“But it’s still a discussion document and gives everyone a chance to take part in rational debate,” he said. “We need clarity on a number of areas, like how co-payment will work. The confusion about the tax burden should be clarified and, during the engagement process, the value for money equation must be clarified.”
Buys said Mediclinic was also concerned about the removal of the tax subsidy for medical schemes as these were already under financial stress.
He said the government needed to think about a multi-tier system in which not only the NHI but also an alternative funding model could be established with the private sector. Buys said countries like Brazil, Thailand and Mexico, which used the multi-tier system, had shown great improvement in their health-care sectors.
The chairman of the Hospital Association of SA, Nkaki Matlala, said private hospitals could play a critical role in helping to address the country’s shortage of health practitioners. “South Africa has a very low ratio of specialists to patients,” he said. “We could use our hospitals as expanded forms of training for medical students because there has been very little development of technology in our medical schools.”
Mediclinic said it was looking forward to playing a bigger role through public-private partnerships and for the public sector to remain a backbone in this. - Londiwe Buthelezi