Gauteng Health fails 64 out of 113 targets

The Gauteng Health Department failed to achieve 64 out of 113 targets in the first quarter of this financial year which covers the period April to June 2015.

This 57% failure rate is revealed in the Department’s First Quarterly Report which was tabled in the Gauteng Legislature and deliberated on at the Legislature’s Health Committee last week  Friday.

The poor performance includes the following:

• Only 34.5 million male condoms distributed, which is 13.5 million less than the 48 million target
• 800 000 female condoms distributed, which is 225 000 less than the 1 million target
• Only 11 659 medical male circumcisions, as against the 38 000 target
• 422 147 tested for HIV, as against the 530 000 target
• Only 2 hospitals instead of 17 hospitals have electronically scanned patient medical records which is needed to cut down on queues
• Second dose measles vaccination at 84%, which is below the 90% National norm
• Cervical cancer screening rate at 43% as against the 55% target
• Only R30 million patient fees collected instead of the expected R139 million

“The department has achieved some successes, including a TB cure rate of 87.5% which exceeds the 86% target, and has brought HIV transmission to newborn babies down to 1.4%.

“But the overall picture is not good, including significant underspends and overspends in the budgets of various programmes,” the Democratic Alliance (DA) Gauteng Shadow for Health Jack Bloom.

He said that it is a bad start this year for a department that claims that it is implementing a successful turnaround strategy.

@scoobieW