BUSA objects to President’s Health Compact
14 August 2024
BUSA will not be signing the President’s Health Compact on Thursday, saying it cannot support a policy that explicitly endorses the NHI Act in its current form. BUSA has written to the President to express its concern.
“The draft of the Compact that was shared with BUSA promotes the NHI in its current form as the foundation underpinning healthcare reform. BUSA does not agree with this given the serious differences between us and government as to the appropriateness of the NHI Act, let alone its feasibility as a legislative instrument to underpin universal health coverage,” says Cas Coovadia, BUSA CEO.
The Presidential Health Summit Compact in 2018 was headlined: ‘Strengthening the South African health system towards an integrated and unified health system’. This was an objective supported by Business, particularly the focus on immediate opportunities for health improvement, including strengthening supply chain management, health infrastructure planning, accountability, augmenting health system resources, as well as the principle of collaboration in healthcare delivery.
The references to NHI in the original Compact were minimal and only in the context of longer term planning.