Many South African children under the age of 10 years are malnourished.
The RDP's Primary School Nutrition Programme is bringing relief to millions
of pupils daily (photograph: Neila Both, SACS).South Africa spends some R550 per capita per annum on health care. The country's health services have. however, until now been fragmented.
One of the first priorities set by the Reconstruction and Development Programme (RDP), is that all the different role-players and services should be drawn into the national health system. This must include both public and private providers of goods and services, and must be organised at national, provincial, district and community levels.
The whole national health system must be driven by a primary health care approach, the ultimate objective of which is to bring about a balance in the rendering of respective health care services and to ensure treatment at the most application point.
At present, provincial health administrations provide institutionalised curative services, especially hospitals, clinics and community health centres.
The functions of local authorities are to provide personal (promotive and preventive) and non-personal (environmental) health services, which include among other things, the supply of potable water, sewage disposal and refuse removal. Local authorities are also responsible for comprehensive primary health care.
Private hospitals, unattached operating threatres and fully equipped private ambulances are also supplied by the private sector.
Various organisations, most of them voluntary, such as the South African Red Cross, Medic Alert, The South African First Aid League, Life Line, Flight for Life and Transnet made a primary health care train available with the aid of private companies.
The Department of Health is responsible for the optimal utilisation of resources for primary, secondary and tertiary health care. The South African Expanded Programme on Immunisation aims to reduce death and disability from vaccine-preventable diseases by making immunisation accessible to all children and women of childbearing age.
The most common communicable diseases in the country are tuberculosis (TB), sexually transmitted diseases (STDs), malaria and measles. The Department of Health has developed a national acquired immune deficiency syndrome (Aids) programme recognising education as the most viable strategy for Aids prevention.
A large number if South African children are malnourished or stunted.
During the past financial year, more than six million poverty-stricken
people across the country received aid from the National Nutrition
and Social Development Programme (NNSDP) of the Department of
Health, the ultimate aim of which is to enable communities to
feed themselves and to become self-sufficient.
Many South African children under the age of 10 years are malnourished.
The RDP's Primary School Nutrition Programme is bringing relief to millions
of pupils daily (photograph: Neila Both, SACS).
The Department of Welfare is responsible for regulating social welfare. South Africa's social welfare service is a partnership between the private and public sectors. There are approximately 2550 registered fund-raising organisations with welfare objectives, some of which operate nationally.
Social assistance in South Africa is regulated by the Social Assistance Act, 1992 (Act 59 of 1992). The Act regulates the payment of various social grants such as grants for the aged, war veterans and disabled persons, as well as maintenance grants, foster child grants, single-care grants and social relief.
Welfare services focus on preventive, promotive and educational aspects of community needs, such as life skill programmes and community education. The following are the main fields in which welfare services are being offered: family, child and youth care, in areas such as divorce matters, substitute care, children in detention, and child labour; care of the disaled; care of the aged; alcohol and drug abuse, and care of the offender.
In March 1995, President Nelson Mandela lad a delegation of the Government of National Unit (GNU) to the Untied Nations (UN) Summit on Social Development held in Copenhagen, Denmark. Key issues which were addressed include the creation of employment, the ending of poverty and social integration. The conference also looked at ways in which countries could increase development across nations. The UN position on development is that it must be sustainable and empower people. The South African experience supports this viewpoint - one of communities should determine their own development priorities.
The Department of Welfare is committed to facilitating relevant training, management and other professional skills accessible to community development workers.
South Africa's acceptance into the international community after
its first democratic election led to much progress in international
liaison on population issues. It also led to South Africa's participation
in the International Conference on Population and Development
(ICPD) which took place in Cairo in 1994. The ICPD's Programme
of Action opens the way for the formulation of a population policy
within the framework of the RDP and the compilation of own action
plans for South African in this regard.
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