SA Must Adopt a Human-Centred Approached to Healthcare Delivery
But Can Telemedicine Close the Gap?
It’s no secret that the Covid-19 pandemic has exposed the existing inequality in South Africa, and in the case of access to healthcare, it exacerbated it.
This is according to Paul Cox, Managing Director of the Essential Group of Companies (which includes health insurance provider EssentialMED).
The latest figures from the South African Medical Research Council (SAMRC) estimate that the number of excess deaths in South Africa between May 2020 and March 2021 is 146,626,[1]- a far cry from the most recent official Covid death toll of 52,196[2]. By comparing the time trends in excess deaths, SAMRC says that between 85-95% of the unaccounted deaths were likely to be directly related to Covid and that the remaining 5-15% were probably collateral causes due t...