Health Beat 23 | What the NHI could be — if run well
Shabir Moosa
Chiawelo Community Practice in Soweto is a National Health Insurance (NHI)-like project that was started in 2014.
It was started by family physician Shabir Moosa and could potentially become a model for the NHI.
Housed in the local government community health centre, the project uses community health workers to gather and write up health information for 30 000 residents they’re assigned to and regularly visit. They even run exercise groups.
A decade later, patients fall ill less frequently and visit health facilities less often with medical emergencies.
It’s not the only example of solid-state healthcare: success stories abound, from Charlotte Maxeke Academic Hospital in the heart of Johannesburg — to isolated Manguzi Hospital in northern KwaZulu-Natal.
