NHI Bill on its way to parliament

Cabinet to discuss national health legislation for tabling within weeks

THE long-awaited National Health Insurance (NHI) Bill is before a cabinet sub-committee, a vital step before it can be signed off by the full cabinet and tabled in parliament. A key provision of the bill will be the establishment of an NHI fund to pay for health services.

“It is likely to be discussed by cabinet within the next couple of weeks,” the health department’s deputy director-general for regulation and compliance, Anban Pillay, said yesterday.

His remarks follow President Cyril Ramaphosa’s affirmation of the government’s commitment to universal healthcare in his state of the nation address on Friday, when he said the NHI Bill would be submitted to parliament within weeks.

The NHI is a set of health financing reforms that aim to provide everyone with healthcare services which are free at the point of delivery.

It is enshrined in the social solidarity principle that everyone should contribute according to their means and will receive benefits according to their needs, in effect ensuring the rich and healthy subsidise the poor and sick.

The government began piloting the NHI in 2011 but has yet to drive through any significant reforms.

“The time has now arrived to finally implement universal health coverage through NHI,” Ramaphosa said on Friday.

Key NHI projects targeting society’s most vulnerable people would begin in April, he said.

Pillay said Health Minister Aaron Motsoaledi was in the process of appointing people to a number of NHI implementation committees.

These appointments and the terms of reference of the committees would be published in the Government Gazette shortly.

The technical work of these committees would run independently of the legislative process to bring the NHI bill into effect, he said.

They would consider issues like NHI benefits, human resource requirements and health technology.

Ramaphosa also announced during his speech that the government would start a major cancer campaign in three months, similar to the government’s massive HIV counselling and testing campaign.

It would draw on the private sector, he said.

“We need to mobilise all resources to fight this disease,” Ramaphosa said.

He also emphasised the government’s commitment to combating the HIV-Aids epidemic, promising to provide treatment to a further two million people by 2020. – Business Day