A recent weekly press briefing by the Western Cape Premier Alan Winde to update the province on the COVID pandemic set me thinking and asking myself some difficult questions. With the advent of the Omicron COVID variant, countries around the world have reacted with further restrictions placed on their citizens. International travel for the average citizen has ground almost to a halt with disastrous consequences for the hospitality industry and the many other commercial entities dependent on this sector. Despite these new and draconian restrictions, almost impulsively implemented, the numbers of Omicron infections across the globe continue to rise. In South Africa where the Omicron variant was first identified, the…
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Health management … what do I need to be a health manager?
I was asked by a reader of one of my recent posts, what I regarded as the ideal preparation to become a manager of health services? The question was posed by a medical student about to graduate as a doctor and it set me thinking what is the best preparation for entering the field of health management? Given my background and experience I will focus primarily on a management career in the public health service. So here are my thoughts … I do not think that management of health services is the province of medical practitioners alone although for many years it was the case as evidenced by those who…
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Gift of the Givers and a Vaccine Task Force … lessons to be learnt
Recently it was reported that Gift of the Givers, a charitable organisation, has been distributing food to hospitals in the Eastern Cape. This was reportedly due to the provincial health department being unable to ensure adequate food supplies to patients due to what was termed a “budget shortfall”. If even partially true it is an iniquitous situation for State hospitals to find themselves and begs the question, why has it come to this? I have written on many occasions that we should expect greater accountability from those responsible for the management of health departments in this country. This is not the first time the unacceptable conditions in Eastern cape Hospitals…