POLICY BRIEFING Universal Health Coverage Doesn't Need to Wait for the Courts Separating South Africa's UHC progress from the NHI impasse June 2026 AT A GLANCE UHC Service Coverage Index ~71 (2021 WHO data) — among the highest in sub-Saharan Africa, roughly level with the 2023 global average Weakest UHC indicator Financial protection (SDG 3.8.2) — driven by the public/private financing divide, not by the NHI litigation NHI Act status Signed into law May 2024; never proclaimed

War on the Wards: Unsolicited Policy Advice at the NHI Crossroads — Without Losing the Public Dr Sipho Kabane: SDK Health Leadership16 May 2026 I. The Battlefield Beneath the Court Case South Africa’s healthcare debate is frequently framed as a confrontation between reform and resistance, or between transformation and privilege. Such framings are politically convenient, but analytically insufficient. The deeper conflict is between two competing anxieties that now coexist wit

When Profit Trumps Patients: The Unacceptable Reality of Delayed Chronic Medication Delivery In a system designed to safeguard health, it is deeply troubling when the very institutions entrusted with this responsibility begin to undermine it. Across South Africa, an increasing number of medical scheme members are experiencing a disturbing pattern: while monthly contributions are collected with unwavering precision, the delivery of essential chronic medication is anything but

Five Years, Millions Spent — and Still No Action: When Practitioners Are Ill-Treated, Patients Pay the Price By Dr Sipho Kabane SDK Health Leadership In July 2025, the long-awaited Section 59 Inquiry Report into allegations of racial bias and procedural unfairness in fraud, waste and abuse (FWA) investigations by medical schemes was finally released. It took five years to complete.It consumed considerable public and private resources .It involved extensive data analysis,

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