Community health forums say they have been sidelined and not been properly engaged in the running of health services in the Western Cape, leaving them in the dark about health delivery failures.
On Tuesday, a small group of community health workers, led by the Cape Metro Health Forum, marched to the provincial legislature to deliver their list of grievances which include a lack of response by the department to the chronic medication crisis.
The province has been experiencing ongoing problems with the distribution of chronic medication to clinics following the takeover of the centralised Chronic Dispensing Unit (CDU) service.
UTi Pharma took over the distribution of chronic medication to almost 200 000 patients in the province in April.
Since then, the service has been beset with problems – including delays in the delivery of pre-packed medicine and shortages of medication. These glitches have resulted in long queues and some patients being turned away.
In a memorandum handed over to the department yesterday, the forums said there was not only silencing of community participation under Health MEC Theuns Botha’s leadership, but also an abuse of power at community level, exploitation of community care workers, as well as a lack of funding of these structures.
The department said the forum was marching to air its grievances with the withdrawal of its funding.
Cape Argus