Aaron Nicodemus
A leading Y2K expert says South Africa’s public hospitals are woefully unprepared for the January 1 2000 computer glitches that may disrupt the flow of medical supplies and cause life-support systems to malfunction. Private hospitals are only doing slightly better, says Mohammed Madhi, CEO of Cyberknowledge Systems and a national expert on Y2K.
In a worst-case scenario, electricity and water supplies would terminate on January 1 2000, crippling hospitals. Once the electricity returns, hospitals would find many of their life-support machines malfunctioning or shutting down as their internal clocks would believe it to be January 1 1900.
“I’m very sceptical about the level of energy being put into the problem,” says Madhi. “It’s only recently that hospitals have begun attacking the problem. They don’t have a feel for what the total cost is going to be, and what exactly has to be done.”
Madhi says that since South African hospitals are so far behind, the health care industry should refocus its efforts on contingency planning.
Veli Mahlangu, risk and scenario manager at the government-funded Y2K Centre in Pretoria, agrees with Madhi’s assessment. He is creating a national contingency plan for Y2K.
Mahlangu says that a discussion with a top official at the National Disaster Service confirmed that nothing has been done there to address Y2K.
There are other impediments to creating a Y2K contingency plan, he says. “Hospital administrators fear heading up such a plan because, if it fails, they fear they’ll be blamed and then fired.” There is also the issue of funding and resources, both of which are issues for a public health care system that has enough budget trouble.
Madhi says Netcare is one of the few hospital chains that has adequately prepared for Y2K. Dr Ian Kadish, Netcare executive director, says his hospitals have created disaster plans in preparation for the possible shutdown of services. “We’ve put diesel generators in place,” he says.
Even more at risk of disastrous failure are small private hospitals and rural hospitals, which might not have the resources to combat Y2K.
l The United States Food and Drug Administration has set up a repository of information for the health care industry on the Internet. The address is .
For more information, contact Desr Hilson at (0331) 95-3246, or Lebona Moshayana at (012) 312-0605