Reuters AlertNet Lite - SOUTH AFRICA: Dr Monwabisi Ray Belle waseMaBheleni, "I hung on to the public sector for a long time"

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SOUTH AFRICA: Dr Monwabisi Ray Belle waseMaBheleni, "I hung on to the public sector for a long time"

09 Apr 2009 16:38:51 GMT
Source: IRIN

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JOHANNESBURG, 9 April 2009 (IRIN) - Dr Monwabisi Ray Belle waseMaBheleni is a gynaecologist and obstetrician running a practice geared towards low-income women in the inner city of Johannesburg, South Africa's commercial hub.

Despite being the sub-continent's economic powerhouse, South Africa still struggles with high rates of infant and maternal mortality. Belle spoke to IRIN about how his earlier political activism helped shape his commitment to public service.

"I studied at the University of Natal ... I chose to study obstetrics, mainly because of the effect that organized obstetrics can have on a population. If you're organized, and you know what you're doing, you can have a tremendous outcome. Also, it was one of the world's best-taught subjects at the school, and the only one with a lot of African senior lecturers.

"We used to run student clinics in underprivileged areas. In Inanda, in KwaZulu-Natal [Province on the east coast], we were actually the first clinic to be there; government clinics only came maybe 20 years later.

"We also used to run, on campus, a domestic workers' clinic that opened up on Sunday and was convenient for people who were working during the week and were only allowed off on Sunday.

"In the student clinics we cut our teeth in terms of how to organize [medical services]. That experience imposed a certain type of morality and outlook on you in terms of meeting the needs of the population you were serving. The goal was always to work in the public sector.

"The biggest problem that doctors had when we came back in 1994 [at the end of apartheid] was that there was almost an entire change in health leadership, both inside the country and amongst those who came from exile.

"Some of the things [the new government] embarked on, like denying that the HIV virus existed, were highly reactionary. It sort of signified a turn, and a lot of people were discouraged from taking up public posts.

"I hung on to the public sector for a long time - I'd been working as a part-time consultant in one of the public hospitals - until I really had to give up because of the chaos that goes on there.

"To a large extent it's true if I tell you the public sector is in a state of collapse, and something drastic [needs to be] done to restore it to its former glory.

"[But things] may change in the next few months because there are new opportunities coming; a new thinking and fresh ideas [have come] to the fore, first because of the political change [since President Thabo Mbeki left office] and second, because [of the new health] minister."

llg/oa/he

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