Books on the topic 'South African healthcare'

Chapter 18 describes how Dr Motsoaledi, the South African Health Minister, set about leading the fight on HIV/AIDS in South Africa, and introducing a national health insurance scheme in order to offer healthcare to every person in the country, by building on the work that was already underway. It describes his complex story, with many confusing cross-currents and elements of conflict and intrigue, and how a large part of the Minister’s role involved trying to cut through the confusion, offer a clear pathway for the future, and communicate

Although telemental health (TMH) in Africa shares much with TMH in well-resourced nations, significant differences exist. These mainly result from relatively small funds available for all forms of healthcare, inadequate infrastructure, lack of mental healthcare personnel, and cross-cultural difficulties. The majority of individuals with severe mental illness receive no treatment in most African countries. This lack has been alleviated in part by some “North–South” and “South–South” TMH programs, in addition to other locally initiated programs. African TMH has emphasized provision of a wide variety of TMH—education, managing psychotrauma in regions of violent upheavals, and the provision of other TMH services. Novel African telecommunications techniques and means of providing TMH, for example using broadcast media and diasporic mental healthcare personnel, are outlined. So, future African TMH will surely grow because of decreasing equipment costs, but principally because of proven effectiveness and the power of such interventions.

Why do resource-constrained countries make costly commitments to universal health coverage and AIDS treatment after transitioning to democracy? At a time when the world’s wealthiest nations struggle to make healthcare and medicine available to everyone, this book explores the dynamics that made landmark policies possible in Thailand and Brazil but which have led to prolonged struggle and contestation in South Africa. While conventional wisdom suggests that democratization empowers the masses, this book draws attention to an underappreciated dynamic: that democratization empowers elites from esteemed professions – frequently doctors and lawyers – who forge progressive change on behalf of those in need in the face of broader opposition at home and from abroad. The relative success of professional movements in Thailand and Brazil and failure in South Africa highlights critical differences in the character of political competition. Whereas fierce political competition provided opportunities for professional movements to have surprising influence on the policymaking process in Thailand and Brazil, the unrivaled dominance of the African National Congress allowed the ruling party the luxury of entertaining only limited healthcare reform and charlatan AIDS policy in South Africa. The book offers lessons for the United States and other countries seeking to embark on expansive health reforms.

South Africa has experienced a major outflow of health professionals since the end of apartheid in 1994 and this brain drain has led to a significant decline in the quality of healthcare across the country’s health institutions. This chapter provides a critical assessment of South Africa’s health professional retention strategies and asks if these have led to any significant shifts in the emigration intentions of highly skilled health professionals (medical doctors and specialists, dentists and pharmacists). The chapter provides an overview of the scale of the brain drain from the country and the emigration intentions of those still there and in training. It then examines the various strategies that the government has adopted to staunch the flow. Finally, using data from 2007 and 2013 surveys of health professionals by the Southern African Migration Program, the chapter assesses whether these strategies have had any discernible impact.

The first cases of a new coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2) were identified toward the end of 2019 in Wuhan, China. Over the following months, this virus spread to everywhere in the world. By now no country has been spared the devastation from the loss of lives from the disease (Covid-19) and the economic and social impacts of responses to mitigate the impact of the virus. Our lives in South Africa have been turned upside down as we try to make the best of this bad situation. The 2020 school year was disrupted with closure and then reopening in a phased approach, as stipulated by the Department of Education. This booklet is a collective effort by academics who are Members of the Academy of Science of South Africa (ASSAf) and other invited scholars to help you appreciate some of the basic scientific facts that you need to know in order to understand the present crisis and the various options available to respond to it. We emphasise that the threat of infectious diseases is not an entirely new phenomenon that has sprung onto the stage out of nowhere. Infectious diseases and pandemics have been with us for centuries, in fact much longer. Scientists have warned us for years of the need to prepare for the next pandemic. Progress in medicine in the course of the 20th century has been formidable. Childhood mortality has greatly decreased almost everywhere in the world, thanks mainly, but not only, to the many vaccines that have been developed. Effective drugs now exist for many deadly diseases for which there were once no cures. For many of us, this progress has generated a false sense of security. It has caused us to believe that the likes of the 1918 ‘Spanish flu’ pandemic, which caused some 50 million deaths around the world within a span of a few months, could not be repeated in some form in today’s modern world. The Covid-19 pandemic reminds us that as new cures for old diseases are discovered, new diseases come along for which we are unprepared. And every hundred or so years one of these diseases wreaks havoc on the world and interferes severely with our usual ways of going about our lives. Today’s world has become increasingly interconnected and interdependent, through trade, migrations, and rapid air travel. This globalisation makes it easier for epidemics to spread, somewhat offsetting the power of modern medicine. In this booklet we have endeavoured to provide an historical perspective, and to enrich your knowledge with some of the basics of medicine, viruses, and epidemiology. Beyond the immediate Covid-19 crisis, South Africa faces a number of other major health challenges: highly unequal access to quality healthcare, widespread tuberculosis, HIV infection causing AIDS, a high prevalence of mental illness, and a low life expectancy, compared to what is possible with today’s medicine. It is essential that you, as young people, also learn about the nature of these new challenges, so that you may contribute to finding future solutions.

Community responses to the AIDS crisis have changed traditional approaches to medicine, healthcare, health systems, and research. Earlier approaches were rooted in widespread discrimination against key affected populations who were already socially marginalized. The background of community responses, first in the United States and then in other regions, each has a special history. This chapter provides an overview of historical community responses to HIV and is written by activists from the United States, India, South Africa and Western Europe. Examples of key projects include the role of peer advocacy and treatment literacy, which have enabled people living with HIV to learn more about HIV and treatment, adherence, treatment choice, drug resistance, and pipeline research for better drugs in the future. The outcome of this advocacy is that people living with HIV have been empowered to take an active role in their healthcare. HIV advocacy also provides an example of how the international activism that has changed the face of global healthcare is rooted in similar principles developed by early HIV-positive activists and is just as relevant today.

In Poverty and Neglected Tropical Diseases in the American Rural South, Christine Crudo Blackburn and Macey T. Lively study regions of the United States rarely acknowledged by the average American. These are regions of extreme poverty in the rural American South where a mixture of historical discrimination, structural discrimination, lack of opportunities, and decaying infrastructure conspire to create an environment conducive to chronic, debilitating diseases known as Neglected Tropical Diseases (NTDs). Blackburn and Lively explore the conditions that allow NTDs to thrive in a wealthy nation like the United States when such diseases are typically associated with the poorest communities in Africa, Asia, and South America. Poverty and Neglected Tropical Diseases pulls back the curtain on the reality of poverty and disease in America and tell the story of failing sanitation infrastructure, the lack of clean water, the inability to access healthcare, and the lack of financial security through the eyes of those living it every day.

Jim Crow refers to a set of laws in many states, predominantly in the South, after the end of Reconstruction in 1877 that severely restricted the rights and privileges of African Americans. As a caste system of enormous social and economic magnitude, the institutionalization of Jim Crow was the most significant element in African American life until the 1960s Civil Rights Movement led to its dismantling. Racial segregation, as well as responses to it and resistance against it, dominated the African American consciousness and continued to oppress African Americans and other minorities, while engendering some of the most important African American contributions to society. This major encyclopedia is the first devoted to the Jim Crow era. The era is encapsulated through more than 275 essay entries on such areas as law, media, business, politics, employment, religion, education, people, events, culture, the arts, protest, the military, class, housing, sports, and violence as well as through accompanying key primary documents excerpted as side bars. This set will serve as an invaluable, definitive resource for student research and general knowledge. The authoritative entries are written by a host of historians with expertise in the Jim Crow era. The quality content comes in an easy-to-access format. Readers can quickly find topics of interest, with alphabetical and topical lists of entries in the frontmatter, along with cross-references to related entries per entry. Further reading is provided per entry. Dynamic sidebars throughout give added insight into the topics. A chronology, selected bibliography, and photos round out the coverage. Sample entries include Advertising, Affirmative Action, Armed Forces, Black Cabinet, Blues, Brooklyn Dodgers, Bolling v. Sharpe, Confederate Flag, Congress of Racial Equality (CORE), Detroit Race Riot 1943, Ralph Ellison,Eyes on the Prize, G.I. Bill, Healthcare, Homosexuality, Intelligence Testing, Japanese Internment, Liberia, Minstrelsy, Nadir of the Negro, Poll Taxes, Rhythm and Blues, Rural Segregation, Sharecropping, Sundown Towns, Booker T. Washington, Works Project Administration, World War II.

Recent years have witnessed considerable speculation about the potential of open data to bring about wide-scale transformation. The bulk of existing evidence about the impact of open data, however, focuses on high-income countries. Much less is known about open data's role and value in low- and middle-income countries, and more generally about its possible contributions to economic and social development. Open Data for Developing Economies features in-depth case studies on how open data is having an impact across the developing world-from an agriculture initiative in Colombia to data-driven healthcare projects in Uganda and South Africa to crisis response in Nepal. The analysis built on these case studies aims to create actionable intelligence regarding: (a) the conditions under which open data is most (and least) effective in development, presented in the form of a Periodic Table of Open Data; (b) strategies to maximize the positive contributions of open data to development; and (c) the means for limiting open data's harms on developing countries.

Living and working abroad. Sounds glamorous—and maybe it is, if you’re posted to Hong Kong or Sydney. But what if your company sends you to Bangkok, Warsaw, or Manila? Many questions arise: Is it safe to go out at night? Do quality schools exist? How polluted is the air? Is public transportation handy? What’s the average monthly rent for a decent house? What inoculations should you get before you go? Can you find your favorite brand of toothpaste? The Global Manager’s Guide to Living and Working Abroad: Eastern Europe and Asia answers these and many other questions expats will have about the cities that companies send employees to most often in Eastern Europe and Asia, as well as Australia, New Zealand, and South Africa. Though the heart of the book is the city-by-city listing, it also includes tips on preparing for the move, dealing with culture shock, staying connected to the home front, understanding the psychological aspects of living abroad, country-specific business and social etiquette, and other topics of concern to workers sent abroad. The guide also includes information for corporate HR people: When a cost of living differential is appropriate and how to calculate it, how to obtain necessary work permits and visas, how to help employees stay as safe and secure as possible, and how to arrange for healthcare and insurance. Best of all, the information is up to date and comes right from the fresh research of Mercer—the consultancy many other companies turn to for advice and the latest facts regarding working and living conditions in all corners of the globe. That’s why this book will help expatriate employees feel at home in cities far from their native land whether it’s Seoul, Moscow, or Dubai.