Hospitals mismanaged says Bloom
Over 1.7 Billion was sent back to Treasury as unspent from the Gauteng Department of Health for the 2013/2014 financial year.
The Auditor-General (AG) has given another disastrous audit report on the Gauteng Health Department (GHD), according to Jack Bloom, DA Gauteng Shadow Health MEC
The AG identified weaknesses that include poor record-keeping, non-adherence to procedures, large under spends and material losses.
This is after the AG audited the department after the financial year which ended in March.
The last clean audit that the GHD received was in 2006.
In this year audit the AG found the following in the 2012/2014:
· GHD received R771 million for the hospital revitalisation grant but sent back R332 million as unspent.
· R36.5 million not spent on the health infrastructure grant
· R319 million unspent on district health services and R538.5 million not spent on health facilities management
· A total unspent amount of R1.7 billion was returned to the Treasury.
· R225 million was written off in irrecoverable patient debt and impairments to the amount of R1.5 billion were incurred as a result of an increase in provision for doubtful debt relating to patient fees.
· R416 million for fruitless and wasteful expenditure.
· R155 million was incurred in last year due to medico-legal payments arising from hospital negligence.
Hospitals that that badly need upgrades but the GHD can afford to send back R 1.7 billion to Treasury as unspent funds, according to Bloom.
“This shows appalling mismanagement when hospitals are desperately in need of upgrading,” said Bloom.
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