Health companies eye NHI

South Africa's health companies are positioning themselves to potentially cash in on government's National Health Insurance (NHI) plan.

While taxpayers are grimacing at the prospect of added expenses, big business is getting ready for the race for a slice of the multibillion-rand NHI pie.

The proposed NHI plan - set to cost R214-billion by 2014 and which will ultimately be partially funded through additional contributions by taxpayers - was hotly debated on air waves and in cyberspace this week.

But details remained sketchy, and the income threshold of taxpayers who are expected to contribute has yet to be revealed.

The country's largest medical aid scheme, Discovery Health, and private healthcare group Medi-Clinic said they were open to partnering with government on NHI-related business.

Discovery Health CEO Jonathan Broomberg and Roly Buys, Medi-Clinic funder relations executive, both said their companies were eager to help government implement the system.

"Discovery has not been approached thus far to assist with implementation of the NHI," Broomberg told the Sunday Times.

"However, we hope to engage actively with government on the NHI, and to contribute our expertise and assets, which we believe could assist in several aspects of the implementation of the NHI over time."

Buys told Businesslive that private hospitals would be eager to partner with government in the training of staff, among other things.

Said Broomberg: "We believe that the approach to building the NHI as outlined in the policy paper provides a historic opportunity to improve healthcare for all South Africans, and we support the NHI framework.

"Discovery Health is committed to working with government and the Department of Health to ensure that these objectives are achieved."

Thami Bolani, chairman of the National Consumer Forum, welcomed the plan.

"The forum fully supports the implementation of the NHI. Access to quality health is one of the basic rights that South Africans struggled for. Today, many South Africans lack access to this basic service and this is unacceptable."

South African Medical Association spokesman Norman Mabasa said the organisation had appointed an eight-man task team to scrutinise the proposal. "We are hitting the ground running," he said.

Mabasa said the issue of the payment of doctors in the private sector was likely to be a bone of contention in the new scheme.