Gauteng Health MEC Nomantu Nkomo-Ralehoko at a newly renovated paediatric ward at the Steve Biko Academic Hospital in Tshwane, one of the two facilities that she has been ordered to implement vastly improved cancer treatment.
Image: Thobile Mathonsi / Independent Newspapers
GAUTENG Health MEC Nomantu Nkomo-Ralehoko, the department’s head Lesiba Malotana, and the chief executives of the Charlotte Maxeke and Steve Biko academic hospitals have been ordered to urgently implement plans to provide radiation oncology services.
The judgment was handed down this week by Gauteng High Court, Johannesburg, Acting Judge Stephen van Nieuwenhuizen in an urgent application brought by the Cancer Alliance and Section27 after the provincial Health Department ignored their calls for a pressing need to provide the treatment required by patients.
Information detailed in the high court shows that a significant backlog of cancer patients has built up largely at the Charlotte Maxeke Johannesburg Academic Hospital, resulting in about 3 000 cancer patients not receiving radiation oncology treatment in the past three years.
The Cancer Alliance, which is made up of a group of 30 cancer control non-profit organisations, has provided information that the backlog at the two hospitals reflected a number of 3 026 patients and 2 400 patients by May 2023, with many having been on the list for several years.
Van Nieuwenhuizen declared that the failure of Nkomo-Ralehoko, Malotana, and two hospitals' bosses to devise and implement a plan to provide radiation oncology services timeously in Gauteng to cancer patients on the backlog list was unlawful and unconstitutional and in breach of the Constitution.
This happened following the department receiving ring-fenced funding for cancer treatment. Cancer Alliance and Section27 must now deliver to Malotana a copy of the backlog list as it existed after it compiled it.
Nkomo-Ralehoko, Malotana, and the CEOs have been directed to update the backlog list of cancer patients who are awaiting radiation oncology services in Gauteng within 45 days from the date of Van Nieuwenhuizen’s order and maintain its Protection of Personal Information Act compliance and be broken down by hospital.
The high court also directed the four state functionaries to take all steps necessary to provide radiation oncology services to patients on the backlog list awaiting treatment at both hospitals at a public and/or private facility.
Nkomo-Ralehoko, Malotana, and the CEOs must also file an updated report within three months from the date of the acting judge’s order.
The report must detail steps taken to provide radiation oncology services to cancer patients who are on the backlog list in Gauteng and Nkomo-Ralehoko's long-term plan to provide radiation oncology services to cancer patients at both hospitals.
Van Nieuwenhuizen said in the event that the health MEC fails to comply with his orders, Cancer Alliance is entitled to re-enrol the matter on the same papers duly supplemented to the extent necessary and where necessary to make use of oncology radiotherapy medical experts.
Cancer Alliance and Section27 have also launched another application in which they want to overturn Malotana’s April 2024 decision to cut the R784 million budget for outsourcing radiation oncology services to R250m.
The organisations want Malotana's decision to be declared irrational, arbitrary, unlawful, and of no force or effect.
In addition, they have asked the high court to review and set aside Nkomo-Ralehoko, Malotana and Health Minister Dr Aaron Motsoaledi’s April 2024 decision to award the radiation oncology services tender to Varian Medical Systems.
Last month, Nkomo-Ralehoko opened a new breast health clinic at Charlotte Maxeke, which was donated by Novartis SA.
The facility aims to enhance breast cancer detection, treatment, and research in Gauteng as well as significantly improving access to specialised care.
It is hoped that the facility will alleviate congestion in outpatient departments, reduce waiting times, and improve patient experience.
Additionally, it will serve as a multidisciplinary centre for clinical care, research and training in collaboration with Wits University and strengthen the hospital’s role as a leading oncology treatment centre.
According to the department, the breast health clinic reinforces its commitment to expanding and improving cancer services, highlights broader interventions in cancer care, including the expansion of radiation oncology centres from two to four in the province, and capacitating Charlotte Maxeke with more staff and medical equipment to add to the ongoing efforts to reduce the oncology backlog.
In October last year, the department explained that the backlog in cancer treatment, especially radiotherapy, has been exacerbated by an influx of patients from outside Gauteng, resulting in long waiting times.
At the time, it said there were over 2 600 patients awaiting radiotherapy, who were mostly for prostate and breast cancer.
Cancer Alliance and Section27 celebrated the ground-breaking judgment with the thousands of cancer patients and their families, whose lives will forever be changed as a result.
DA shadow health MEC Jack Bloom demanded that Nkomo-Ralehoko and Malotana be fired by Premier Panyaza Lesufi after what he described as a “stunning rebuke” of the department for a scandal he estimates has cost more lives than the Life Esidimeni tragedy that left 144 mental health patients dead after being sent to unsuitable and unregistered non-governmental organisations.
loyiso.sidimba@inl.co.za