148 people die of tuberculosis (TB) daily in South Africa. According to the South African TB survey, South Africa is one of thirty high burden TB countries that contribute to 87% of estimated incident cases worldwide. Speaking at the opening…
Academics, activists and medical professionals have rung the alarm bell over the further deterioration of South Africa’s public health services if stringent budget-cutting measures are implemented immediately. South Africa has been facing fiscal strain with increased interest rates and high…
Karabo Rafube (41), a former inmate who contracted tuberculosis (TB) in prison says it’s concerning that the fight against the infectious disease continues to be neglected within South African prisons. He was speaking after the recent launch of a new…
By Edina Amponsah-Dacosta, University of Cape Town and Julie Copelyn, University of Cape Town South Africa has experienced outbreaks of cholera since January. The worst was in May in Hammanskraal, north of Pretoria, where nearly 30 people died. Cholera is…
by Onke Ngcuka, Daily MaverickWeather experts have sent out an alert about the possible impacts of an El Niño manifesting in the central Pacific Ocean, but they are uncertain what effect it will have across southern Africa. El Niño is…
Although South Africa has come a long way in treating HIV, considerable challenges remain in closing the gaps to reach the UN 95-95-95 target by 2030. The aim is to have 95% of all people living with HIV to know…
Youth Month calls us to reflect both on the historic debt we owe previous generations of young people who fought for our freedom and on the challenge of breathing hope and self-belief into the hearts of the current generation. The…
The Health Justice Initiative (HJI) says the National Health Insurance (NHI) Bill provides no clarity on how medicine selection, procurement, pricing and access will be managed to ensure broad medicine access. HJI founder, Fatima Hassan says it’s unclear how the…
Victoria Satchwell was desperate when she called the fifth pharmacist asking them to dispense abortion pills for an almost 10-week pregnant client. The woman is a 19-year-old rape victim living in Vredefort, a small farming town in the Free State.…
By Hannah Zhihan Jiang Healthcare workers (HCWs) say targeted programmes to destigmatise mental illnesses and support mental health among HCWs after the COVID-19 pandemic is needed more than ever. They stress the need to debunk the stereotype that HCWs are…
This International Nurses Day is bittersweet for many nurses working in South Africa’s public healthcare system. With the devastating shortage of nurses, ongoing wage battles, unsafe working conditions, and lack of resources, nurses say there is very little to celebrate.…
In 2022, there was a resurgence of influenza activity, following the Covid-19 pandemic. Currently, the National Institute of Communicable Diseases (NICD) is unable to say what the flu trend will look like this winter. However, a prevalence in cases is…
Disease experts warn it is critically important that South Africans get their Covid-19 vaccines, especially immunocompromised people. This comes after the World Health Organisation declared Covid-19 is no longer a global public health emergency. Professor Cheryl Cohen, Head of the…
The ongoing struggles in South Africa’s public healthcare system, including staff shortages, poor infrastructure and surgery backlogs, came under the spotlight on Tuesday when parliamentarians raised their concerns with Health Minister Joe Phaahla. The minister was delivering his department’s budget…