Eight SA National Tuberculosis Association (Santa) hospitals in the Eastern Cape have run out of money and will begin discharging some of their 1 600 TB patients unless financial relief arrives from the provincial health department.
The decision was taken at an emergency meeting of Santa hospital managers and the Eastern Cape executive committee of Santa in Grahamstown on Tuesday.
As of Thursday the department will be three months behind on subsidy payments to the eight hospitals, to which it now reportedly owes about R8-million.
The hospitals are now so cash-strapped that they have little food or other supplies for their patients, the majority of whom are very ill with TB.
Shortly after Tuesday’s meeting, several of the institutions received faxes from the health department in Bisho saying the subsidies would be available in their bank accounts from 3pm on Tuesday.
However, by the time the banks closed, none of them had received confirmation of the funds being deposited.
”It is with regret that having served the community and TB patients for more than 50 years, through our hospitals and branches, we find ourselves unable to continue due to the non-payment of hospital subsidies from Bisho,” said Santa Eastern Cape provincial manager, Celeste Lesar, in a statement.
”Committed as we are to providing quality care to TB patients we will, as from Friday, have to stop admitting new patients and start discharging patients back to clinics and communities following revised emergency discharge criteria.”
She emphasised that should the hospitals receive financial relief from Bisho before Friday, they would not have to follow this course and would continue their services as before.
Santa has ”reserved the right to seek appropriate legal relief” over the funding issue.
The association also took strong exception to the ”derogatory statements” attributed to acting health MEC Max Mamase in press reports at the weekend and said a public apology would be appropriate.
Mamase was quoted as dismissing claims that Santa hospitals had not been paid and said those claiming this were ”playing games”.
However, health permanent secretary Dr Siphiwo Stamper later acknowledged they had not been paid and said those responsible for this could be disciplined.
TB was recently described by Mamase as the ”main killer disease in the Eastern Cape”.
Discharging hundreds of infected people back into the community could compromise treatment schedules and put immense pressure on clinics and hospitals.
The director of Grahamstown’s Temba Santa hospital, Jurg Richner, recently described it as a ”public health disaster”. – Sapa