Many employers are not waiting for the elusive National Health Insurance (NHI) scheme to improve the health of their workers, absenteeism levels and productivity, reports Business Day. Nor are they waiting for the Health Department and medical scheme regulator the Council for Medical Schemes (CMS) to hammer out a set of benefits for a low-cost medical scheme option.
Instead, the report says, about 400,000-450,000 employees have been signed up for primary healthcare plans that at least give them access to GPs, medicine, basic blood tests and X-rays in the private sector so they can avoid the time-consuming and inefficient clinics and state hospitals for these services. But, it says, it’s a small dent in a potential market of about 8.3m households…..more
