"Poor diagnosis leads to poor remedies." This‚ the Democratic Alliance’s Dr Wilmot James said‚ could apply to Health Minister Dr Aaron Motsoaledi’s failure to identify poor medical practices as the cause of the malpractice claims means.

“Instead‚ Motsoaledi blames ‘excessive charges’ and ‘unprofessional conduct’ by the litigating lawyers’ fraternity‚ and proposed a limit on malpractice pay-outs‚” said James.

He was referring to Motsoaledi’s parliamentary reply to DA questions that revealed that the health department‚ in the past four years‚ has incurred R1.2-billion in legal costs relating to medical malpractice.

“R1.2-billion is a considerable amount of money that could have been spent on essential health services‚ not fighting lawsuits due to negligence and‚ in some cases‚ the incompetence of medical staff in the public sector‚” said James‚ who added that he wants Motsoaledi to appear before the portfolio committee on health.

“Litigation costs of the national and provincial departments of health grew from R190.6-million in 2012 to an astounding R388.7-million in 2015 – a 35% escalation per year.”

James cited a Free Market Foundation study which found the highest proportion of claims against government hospitals “is for birth-related injuries such as brain damage‚ particularly cerebral palsy‚ which accounts for 43.5% of all malpractice claims that range between R5-million and R20-million an incident”.

He added that Motsoaledi’s stance on malpractice means that “little or no remedial action is being taken on a hospital by hospital basis indeed”.

James said “cadre deployment among hospital administrators and the chaotic procurement of medical equipment‚ pharmaceuticals and medical waste disposal have made malpractice endemic and‚ regrettably‚ ubiquitous”.