Moonstone Monitor 12 June 2008: Healthcare Bill Under Fire

National Health Amendment Bill

The words "brewing" and "heavyweight" used hereunder should please be seen in the context it was intended.

It would appear that a huge legal battle is brewing between government and the private healthcare sector over the proposed National Health Amendment Bill. Reports today indicate that two of the bigger players in the industry are gearing up to take on the Minister of Health legally to prevent certain parts of the Bill being promulgated into law. They have a renowned heavyweight in their corner in the form of Helen Zille, formidable leader of the DA and Mayor of Cape Town.

According to a Business Day report, Zille said that the proposed legislation would have the opposite effect on the health sector from what is intended, driving prices higher and increasing the numbers of professionals emigrating. The Bill would effectively give the Minister the power to determine private sector hospital fees. ‘High prices in the private sector are the government's fault for creating an uncompetitive and overregulated environment, and for enforcing an artificial divide between the public and the private sectors.’ It is the second Bill in the past month – after the Expropriation Bill – to attempt to circumscribe the powers of the courts to adjudicate on the fairness of state actions. Strong words indeed.

Numbers of delegations have met with various government sectors to discuss this highly controversial amendment to an Act regulating a vital industry already besieged by huge problems. Kurt Worrall-Clare, chief executive for the Hospital Association of SA who met with the Minister on Saturday is quoted in The Times as saying: ‘It is clear that there are ideological differences and fundamental misconceptions about private healthcare.

Speculation is that the Minister will undergo a transplant of another nature when the post-Polokwane government takes over.

A further issue concerns the determination of which health insurance policies fall under the jurisdiction of the Medical Schemes Act, and which fall under the short term insurance Act. National Treasury suggests that this should be left to the Minister of Finance through the new proposed Insurance Laws Amendment Bill. Patrick Masobe, the registrar of Medical Schemes, argues that the adjustments should be made via the Medical Schemes Act and that the Minister of Health should decide.

Although the bill suggests that Trevor Manuel, Minister of Finance will be obliged to consult Health Minister Manto Tshabalala-Msimang before he considers a policy to be a health cover product, the final decision will be his, even if this policy falls within the definition of a medical scheme under the Medical Schemes Act.

Need I refer again to the point made repeatedly that we are now so over-regulated that there will soon be a turf war between the various ministers about what falls under who's jurisdiction and what not? And while they cannot make up their minds, the very public after whose interests they are supposed to look suffer.

We are pleased that at last there are product and service providers prepared to stand up for their industry and not allow government to ride roughshod over their constitutional rights.