Imtiaz Sooliman – R5m boost for Groote Schuur Hospital

Let's move on to this story now, where the gift of the givers has

donated 5 million Rand to improve the state of the hute Shu Hospital

in observatory Cape Town. The project is aimed at reducing the

backlog of patients waiting for essential surgeries. The NGO is

urging individuals and businesses to also extend their support for

more on this. We joined by the founder, Dr MTS Suleiman to speak

to us from the mother city doctor, no doubt that you've been engaging

with various stakeholders. Over the past few days, there have been

reports around the hospital being in dire need of essentials. And

maybe just break it down for us in terms of how dire is the situation

at the hospital.

Good evening. There's not a question of being dialed hospital

now. There is a backlog of patients in because of covid 19

many of the surgical theaters have to be closed, and of course,

there's there's not enough staff. And when staff gets sick during

covid, we have in additional crisis. So because of covid

itself, there has been a backlog of 6000 surgical cases, and now

the waves gone down the hospital management, the head of the

surgical unit, Professor Lydia came cross, came up with an idea

that we have to catch up at least 1500 per year. That's the maximum

we can do, depending on the funding, which is 15 million Rand,

and also it's good for 6000 is going to take four years, unless

you know more theaters are open, most staff are brought in. The

problem with that is patients become more debilitated. Many may

die in the process. Many will not be economically active. There's

anxiety, there's stress. Mothers don't know the children will be

fine. Children don't know the parents will be fine. So the

faster we move, the better it is. We cannot afford any more backlog,

plus people are waiting for just too long. The good thing about

this, it's indicative of a caring public service. You know,

healthcare workers, where the management, the staff and

everybody involved are prepared to give extra time, extra hours, you

know about no extra payment to assist, but to add, to add to that

the 15 million Rand is required is to put in an additional a fully

fledged theater team that will concentrate fully on catching up

the 1500 backlog surgeries whilst the rest of the team carrying on

with A normal cases growth that they had pre covid. But whilst

catching up on the normal case load caseload pre covid, they will

also lend a hand to the dedicated team that's there to do the covid

case slowly. So the 50 million Rand, it's towards that. And of

course, there's more money and more staff and more theaters can

open, then we can catch up more than 1500 but this is only one

hospital. There's a similar issues going on in hospitals throughout

South Africa already. Since we broke the story, several hospitals

have called us and said they have similar issues and want to have a

similar intervention. And of course, it's not just the issue of

the backlog at dark there are issues of resources as well.

You've just commended that hospital staff are willing to work

above and beyond to make sure that they are helping as many people as

they can. But they also need the resources to ensure that they are

able to carry out their duties to the best of their ability.

Here's just three aspects to this. You need personnel. You need the

facility, which is the theater in this case, and the wards when they

come out of the theater, where to put the patients. And thirdly, you

need the the consumables. So in in this surgery, there's different

there's various types of procedures involved. You look at

knee replacement and hip replacement, which is very, very

expensive in terms of the implants. Then you look at hernia

repair, you're doing a breast operations. You look at a range of

other cataracts, you know, and cancer type of surgery. So there's

a range of conditions that require various types of surgery. Some

take few minutes. Some take longer. Some take much longer. The

cost factor varies from a small amount to a huge amount, if

there's implants taking place, and in that case, you we averaged off

to 10,000 Rand per patient for 1500 operations. But it's not

exactly like that. They're just averaging it out. The implants and

the consumables are a lot of money. Fortunately, quarter scale

from the resources are committing their consumables to this 1500

cases, you know, and the 15 million is only towards payment of

staff that contributes are coming from the normal stock. So here's

an advantage, or an opportunity for corporate companies, or

medical companies, rather, who supply government hospitals, who

get the contracts, who are making money from the public service, to

come forward and contribute items in Kai at no cost, so we could

save 1500 or help 1500 people, as you know, in this case. But of

course, we got required for many other hospitals in the country.

And the other appeal we making is they are all the doctors who study

the protosphere who've come out of this hospital. You've gained your

experience. You're learning. You're.

Knowledge from the patients who come to that hospital. Right now,

it's a part. It is time for active citizenry, where the country gets

together to help our country and and our communities in need. You

studied here, you gone into private practice, you gone

overseas, you moved out of the country. We need your pounds,

euros, dollars, anything possible to help your fellow create your

mankind, your fellow people who are vulnerable in hotel scheme.

And if the calls come from other hospitals, we expect other medical

personnel and whoever associated with those hospitals to please

support. There's no profit here. It's about making a life better

for men, women and children who are going to great difficulty, a

lot of pain and hardship because they are not functioning. Doctor,

you've made that call to various stakeholders in the private

sector, but the role that government can play in this

instance as well, you do say that it's not just the one hospital

that's going through this difficulty. There are a number

who've been in contact with your organization, crying, with similar

needs. So the role that government can play here and really not just

waiting for the private sector to come on board. The

government has a crucial role to play. But of course, the

government has made an announcement that you got no

money. They're saying they gave instructions to all hospitals that

you can't employ anymore staff if the post become vacant. They can't

place the junior doctors. They can't place community service

doctors. They're saying there's will be no infrastructure upgrade,

there will be no repairs. You know, they don't have money for

additional staffing in some hospitals. There is no money for

food. They're not renewing contracts of doctors. They're not

doing contracts of of nurses. They've cut registrar posts. And

this is a huge disaster, because it means there will be reduced

academic teaching for those students who are going through the

system. But my call is directly to the finance minister, Mister, you

know, got agwana Your tax collection, you raised 100 and 50

billion rand extra, which you did not expect. Of course, the tax

collection is much lower than previously, as we understand that.

But in terms of your budget, you raised 100 and 50 billion rand

extra. To me, it's vital to take a substantial portion of that, but

it's not substantial. It's not going to cost that much, but to

take that money and put a few billion into healthcare, because

health is the number one priority for any country that your citizens

need to be in good shape. And you know, more than anything else, we

should invest in health. We the country was on lockdown. We

probably the only country in the world that shut the country down

when we had no waves, and when we shut the country down, and when no

wave, we lost so many jobs, and there's a bloodbath. We owe it to

our population to come to the heart medically, because when we

did the lockdown, our rationale was that we are preparing the

hospitals for when the wave comes. We didn't prepare the hospitals

because where's the staff that there's there was a shortage of

staff before the covid came. Now there's even less staff. Many

healthcare workers have died. You're not reading contracts,

you're cutting registrar posts, you're not putting additional

doctors. So in which way are you benefiting health service? It is

time to take serious account and to come in with additional

personnel, to come in what consumables, to upgrade

infrastructure and use part of that 100 and 50 billion

specifically for that? Yes, I understand 9 million people's

taxes. Can't assess 60 million people, and that is why we are

citizens, the corporates, business people, professionals have to come

in to assist So collectively, government, corporates, the

public, anybody, 50 Rand, five Rand, 500 and 1000 Rand, let's do

it together to improve the lives of the people of our country. It

could be our children, our mothers, our family. So we require

this combined effort to bring about Ubuntu and helping the

people of our country. Yeah, absolutely. Doctor. MTS. Suleiman,

thank you very much for your time this evening. He's the founder of

the gift of the giver, saying that the spirit of Ubuntu needs to

shine through here, and we cannot rely solely on government,

whatever it you have that you could contribute do it, because it

could be your child, it could be a sister, could be a brother that is

in desperate need of medical assistance, and they are not able

to get that because the resources just aren't there. So.