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NMBMM Immunisation March

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Dear MyPE

This is an extract of a speech delivered by Celeste Barker (MPL) in Nelson Mandela Bay today during a protest march against the Department of Health’s decision to stop supplying baby immunisation meds to private clinics.

This is fundamentally a rights-based health event. The South African Constitution enshrines the rights of all our people to- inter alia – decent healthcare and freedom of choice.

However these rights can be – and are – infringed when the state makes ill considered decisions without reflection and forward planning.

This appears to be the case in the story of access to baby immunisation in the Nelson Mandela Bay Metro (NMBM).

Standard MOU’s (Memoranda of Understanding) between the DOH (Department of Health) and private clinics state that the DOH co-signs an MOU to improve the availability of vaccines via an expanded programme on immunisation and aims to reduce morbidity and mortality – particularly of Measles and Diarrhoea – to strengthen collaboration with private partners and to expand service delivery.

As the province now has achieved an 85% coverage rate, access to baby immunisation has been largely successful, service delivery looks good and by all appearances public private MOU’s support moms and babies of the Eastern Cape.

Unfortunately this success is jeopardised by the DOH’s decision to stop providing private clinics with immunisation stock. The implications of this decision are serious and life threatening.

This statement is not made lightly. Negative spin off of the decision to stop providing immunisation stock to private clinics makes life tough for working moms who depend on private clinics for immunisation. It also makes private immunisation unaffordable at approximately R 1800 per shot!

Not only does this mean that working moms can no longer exercise their right to choose where to take their babies but it means that mothers who work are placed under enormous strain to choose either to forgo immunisation to retain their jobs (based on comments submitted to the DA by working moms) or to resign so that they can sit and wait at state clinics where service is slower than at private clinics.

Thus, in essence, mothers must choose to immunise and loose a job or not to immunise and keep a job!

The DA supports constitutional democracy, the Bill of Rights, freedom of choice and fair opportunities for all our people regardless of their circumstances. We call on the Department of Health to think before it acts, to place people and patients first and to respect constitutional rights.

Because we care and are serious about maternal and children’s rights and because we want to contribute positively and avoid an outbreak of Measles in a risky environment in which many babies have not been immunised, we offer the following suggestions to the Department of Health:

  • We commend the DOH for introducing flexible work hours at the West End Clinic. However, our people need similar access across the length and breadth of this metro – from Uitenhage to Despatch to Port Elizabeth. How about introducing a rotational roster for early morning, pre-work hours, plus consultation times and a post-work hours early evening rotational roster with consultation hours on a staggered basis every day of the week? This will meet the needs of those who work factory shifts, those whose hours are irregular as well as those with regular office hours.
  • In addition to this proposal, we suggest that dedicated baby clinics are opened as they were in the past and that these clinics too offer expanded contact hours. It would also help if state hospitals could seize the opportunity and convert an office or two into hospital – based baby clinics that operate 24/7.

As the DOH includes immunisation statistics from private clinics in its tally of successfully immunised babies, it is likely that if private clinics are forced to close, the contact percentage will drop and a growing number of babies will be at risk.

In order to prevent an outbreak of Measles in the Eastern Cape, we urge the DOH to continue to provide immunisation stock to private clinics until the Department has put plans, staff and infrastructure into place so that the health of our people is not compromised and service is not disrupted.

If this is not done, the responsibility for a life-threatening outbreak will land squarely on the shoulders of a Department that didn’t think, didn’t hear alarm bells and didn’t heed the voice of the people.

Regards

Celeste Barker

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Alan Straton

Chief Cook, Bottle Washer and Broom Mechanic at MyPE
Passionate about Port Elizabeth and definitely NOT packing for Perth. Alan's ethos is epitomised in the words of Nelson Mandela; "I have fought against white domination and I have fought against black domination. I have cherished the idea of a democratic and free society. If need be, it is an ideal for which I am prepared to die." See more articles by Alan.