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Letter to Mahlamba Ndlopfu: Private healthcare probably saved my life — don’t kill it

16 Jan 2025

My leader, I write these hospital chronicles to highlight the sheer scale of resources and speed required to deal with diseases efficiently and effectively. If you destroy medical aid, you will ruin the only functioning part of our healthcare system.

Ah, Chief Dwasaho! I am writing to you a few days after you celebrated the birthday of the “glorious movement”, the ANC, and its famed January 8 Statement.

I should have been there hobnobbing with the high and mighty. I would have used either a helicopter or a luxury yacht for security reasons to get to Robben Island for a photo opportunity standing tall in Madiba’s cell. I couldn’t care less about the kerfuffle following Fikile Mbalula’s arrival in style, albeit late, at the Robben Island leg of the bash. It is much ado about nothing.

Mbaks deserves all the trappings enjoyed by his comrades in government and business. I don’t expect a whole secretary-general to hop on an unreliable ferry – really, guys.

So, I missed out. I feel utterly disconsolate. Truth is, I was on my deathbed.

A summit happened between 26 December 2024, and 1 January 2025. So, picture this: just after Christmas, there was an exclusive summit of infectious bacteria, fungi, and viruses – and yes, they were all there, probably with tiny name tags and PowerPoint presentations.

The topic of the meeting? “How to have the best festive season ever!” After much deliberation (and probably a few rounds of eggnog), they decided to target someone (me) with a weakened immune system. Apparently, they wanted a bit of a holiday special.

The reasoning was clear: “If we’re going to throw a party, let’s ensure the guest of honour isn’t showing up with a fully stocked immune defence, right?” Who knew the holiday season had so much viral networking going on?

So it came to pass that on 2 January, I made a run for the Zuid Afrikaans Hospital in Pretoria. The gloves were off. I was bleeding through the nose and coughing blood.

The hospital triage system to determine the seriousness of one ailment classified me as low risk; I waited for two hours before seeing the medical personnel. I might have waited a week to see a nurse if these were the National Health Insurance (NHI) times. But I digress.

The general practitioner on duty performed a clinical examination and decided to order a full blood count. The results shocked the entire casualty department. Acute infection markers stood at 225; the reading should be five for normal people without an invasion.

The results showed that there had been a genocide against red and white cells.

I had to be rushed for a chest X-ray and a test for pulmonary embolism; shortly thereafter, a diagnosis was made: pneumonia. My heart sank.

It was the fourth time in 20 years that I heard the words: “Unfortunately, we have to hospitalise you; you have pneumonia.” I am bumfuzzled because I had taken a vaccine against pneumonia. It turns out the vaccine protected me against the common one caused by Streptococcus pneumoniae. My new one was bacterial and seemed to have attended an Ivy League university.

The second general practitioner who saw me decided my case needed a specialist. Before being admitted to the hospital ward, I had spent nine hours in casualty due to various tests and a mountain of paperwork that needed to be completed. It was sad to see healthcare professionals buried in manual labour — a paper-based system with no digitisation in sight.

That’s how I met a boffin of medicine, Professor Veronica Ueckermann, who has two specialisations (physician and intensivist), a Doctor of Philosophy (PhD), and two cum laude distinctions for her undergraduate degree in medicine and surgery and her Master of Medicine (MMed) in internal medicine.

She assembled an army of healthcare professionals: a dietician, a physiotherapist, a pulmonologist, and later added a general surgeon and anaesthetist.

She prescribed broad-spectrum antibiotics and pumped my body full of steroids – yes, with the same compound found among druggies. I hoped for the type that increases endurance, builds biceps, and flattens the tummy. Nope.

On day one, while in isolation because the good professor also suspected I might have TB, I had a visitor – a black woman physiotherapist. We did physiotherapy, but it felt more like a fitness routine, akin to the Kaizer Chiefs squad preparing to face Mamelodi Sundowns.

A woman not prone to vanity, she didn’t smile, and I don’t even know her name. Only on day three did my fitness coach smile and ask me to take a stroll. Unbeknown to me, I had been cleared of TB.

The highlight of day two was the dietician’s visit – a Caucasian woman with a beautiful smile. She inquired about my meals, and I confidently told her that I already had a dietician who had prescribed my diet and that I wanted the same provisions. I was chancing my arm.

As it turned out, I designed my own dietary requirements with the help of my lovely wife. There was some resistance from the kitchen staff, but I eventually prevailed. What baffles me is why the hospital struggled to provide something as simple as low-GI bread and avocado.

Bhekisisa Mncube is the first man to succeed in eating his preferred meals in a hospital in 2025.

But hold your applause. Oh yes, with her remarkable foresight, the Greatest Wife of All Time (aka GWAT, a title that rivals the GOAT itself) brought the proper Woolies low-GI bread the night before – until I was released. She knew exactly what I was up against.

I underwent two theatre procedures: a bronchoscopy (lung washing and biopsy for laboratory testing) and, on the day of my release, a colonoscopy due to unexplained anal bleeding. The speed at which the hospital and its personnel arranged these procedures was breathtaking and clinical.

I also witnessed affirmative action in real life. My second dietician was a Muslim woman. I saw an Indian male nurse, young Afrikaner women nurses, and young black women from all ethnic groups, some in charge, all serving with dedication. The entire hospital mirrored the country’s demographics, and it was a marvel to watch. Everyone was busy, with no time for tittle-tattle or lollygagging.

But the hospital had, a day earlier, left me flummoxed. At 5am, a young black woman – in uniform – waltzed into my ward with a self-assured demeanour. She introduced herself and told me she had come to do a rectal swab. I looked at her blankly.

She explained while demonstrating, that she wanted to insert something into my anus to get a specimen to test if I had any hospital-acquired pathogens. Sensing my discomfort, she suggested, by way of demonstration, that I could do the test by myself.

I was still uncomfortable but nodded for her to go ahead. She instructed me to lie face down with my exposed bum, and she inserted a thin tube before disappearing. I’ve just seen the results of that rectal swab; no bacteria were detected.

My leader, I write these hospital chronicles to highlight the sheer scale of resources and speed required to deal with diseases efficiently and effectively. If you destroy the golden goose (medical aid), you will ruin the only functioning part of the healthcare system in the country.

What you fail to understand is that the 9.7 million people covered by medical aid include the 7.4 million taxpayers who keep you fed and protected. The same guys on medical aid keep fires burning for 29 million people on government social wage.

As the middle class, we cannot afford queues and starting at a local clinic for primary healthcare. My burden of diseases requires a multidisciplinary team to be assembled within an hour.

So, ditch the nonsense about the NHI. Minister of Health Aaron Motsoaledi is full of outdated, fuddy-duddy ideas, if not a snollygoster. Ask Great Britain about its NHI – it’s a total disaster, and they’ve been practising it for years.

South African civil servants are woefully ill-equipped to manage an NHI fund. National School of Government, anyone? These bureaucrats are paid to fritter away their days playing solitaire in their offices.

Instead of nationalising healthcare, why not fully privatise it? Ask the medical aids and private healthcare providers to manage health for all. Thus, your dream of universal health coverage will become a reality, private-sector led.

Till next week, my man. Send me nowhere, Ke Janworry Boss. DM

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