Gauteng Health Department ignored report that could have saved Esidimeni patients
16 March 2017
A report commissioned by the Gauteng Health Department in May 2015 found that the service provided by Life Esidimeni (LE) for psychiatric patients was "good value for money" and made recommendations that were ignored concerning the monitoring of patients transferred to NGOs.
According to a written reply by Gauteng Health MEC Gwen Ramokgopa to my questions in the Gauteng Legislature, the report was done by the Health Advance Institute (HAI) which was asked to evaluate the cost of LE's services and to evaluate the appropriate daily tariff per patient.
The report cost R410 500 and was sent to the department on 22 May 2015.
HAI found that the profit over all LE's facilities in 2014/15 was R29.85 million (13.8%) on a turnover of R215.74 million, which was considerably lower than the 28% average profit by health companies on the JSE at that time.