Reflection on NHI: My son was stabbed and we received abysmal service from the state

Hello Cupcake, you who want to save the precious lives of every South African with your lauded National Health Insurance plan. Free.

So why am I pacing the pavement 45 minutes after my child has been stabbed with no sign of a state ambulance?

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Oh, I have a reference number but no ambulance and the Golden Hour is running out. Have you heard of the Golden Hour, Cyril?

That’s the window you have to save a boy bleeding from a stab wound in his stomach.

My message was clear: I need an ambulance like now at this pavement I’m stomping in my slippers: he’s been stabbed multiple times and he is bleeding out. But let me not bore you with “details”…

Details like three phone calls to your nationwide emergency number but the phone is just put down.

Details like when I do go through with my life-and-death message it is not – I promise you, Cyril – about let’s send the ambulance and I’ll get your details while its on the way.

It’s like “Mam, calm down, how do I spell you surname? And let’s just clear up the address: 37 Hartman street?”

Not a word is asked about his injuries; where; what. It’s in the details, Cyril.

It wasn’t a total failure, I must admit. I got a phone call 45 minutes later to say the ambulances are very busy with a very big accident somewhere “but we’ll keep in touch”.

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And that was the moment I gave your NHI the finger, Cyril.

I called a private ambulance service; was not cut off; asked what they would charge to pick up a bleeding-out stab victim like now and take him to a state hospital; got a price; was asked only for my address and heard the wonderful words: “The ambulance is on its way.”

Not only an ambulance, but a medic in a separate car rocked up at my pavement hardly 10 minutes later.

Three minutes later I heard the verdict: he’s got a broken arm; don’t worry about the stab wound to the shoulder but the one to the stomach looks as if he is bleeding internally.

Seven minutes later he was on his way to a state hospital and I quietly paid over part of my grocery budget electronically.

They bypassed the red tape and pushed him straight into that room your NHI reserves for serious cases. But now he is at the mercy of a state hospital.

Can you save his life, Cyril? I have little faith.