I read with interest a recent report of the proceedings from a recent conference held in Cape Town. The conference, it was reported, brought together healthcare workers, researchers and community activists from 11 African countries. The focus of the conference was the unequal provision of surgical procedures to those living in rural areas and those without a medical aid or medical insurance. At the conference it was stated that before the COVID-19 pandemic the lack of access to surgical procedures was a challenge for public health services but that this had been exacerbated by restrictions on surgical procedures during the pandemic with an estimated 175 000 people now waiting for…
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A reflection on “Echoes of Austerity” … the truth should be told!
I recently, completely by chance, came across a paper published in 2019 in a peer-reviewed journal, Focaal – Journal of Global and Historical Anthropology, authored by a United States based, South African academic, Theodore (Ted) Powers entitled, “Echoes of Austerity”. (https://www.berghahnjournals.com/view/journals/focaal/2019/83/fcl830102.xml?rskey=kneG81&result=1) It was disconcerting to find that I featured as a less than flattering central point of this anthropological discourse on, “Policy, temporality and public health in South Africa”. Further investigation revealed that Powers is an Associate Professor at the University of Iowa having previously been affiliated to the University of Pretoria. In the abstract of the paper he indicates that his intention was “to explore how policy principles associated with…
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The Difficult Dilemma of COVID-19 in our 2020 World!
I write this article as a 72-year old man with hypertension well-controlled on antihypertensive medication and as such an individual who falls into the group of individuals at higher risk for a more complicated course of COVID-19 should I acquire that infection. I am also a doctor and spent my professional life as both a practicing specialist clinician and a manager of health services. The reason for my stating this at the outset will become apparent to the reader. In South Africa the surge of COVID-19 cases and COVID-19 associated deaths overall first peaked around July of this year, 2020, and subsequently declined. Prior to the surge the country went…