Issued by: Office of the MEC FOR HEALTH, Gauteng
2 December 1997
This year, the International Day of the Disabled - December 3 - will become something of a landmark in this country with the launch by Vice-President Thabo Mbeki of our first White Paper on Disability.
It is no secret that a strong case will be made for disability to be recognised as a human rights issue. It is also certain that no sector of society will be allowed to escape its responsibility for assisting disabled people to take their place i the mainstream of national life.
In this context, the health service is only one among many players. But far from decreasing our load, an integrated approach to disability will challenge us to raise our level of contribution.
Rehabilitation
Rehabilitation services comprise a particularly important part of the health sector's role. In many ways, rehabilitation is the first step which makes all future steps towards integration into society more achievable.
In the Gauteng Health Department we have confronted the fact that rehabilitation services were low priority in the system we inherited. Over the last two years we have worked actively towards a more just and adequate provision. We believe our efforts in this direction will bear fruit in the first half of 1998.
Firstly, rehabilitation wards will be added to at least three hospitals in this period.
South Rand Hospital, Edenvale Hospital and Pretoria West Hospital will gain a total of 100 new rehabilitation beds, able to accommodate clients for up to 12 weeks. These facilities will assist us to ensure that our clients are truly able to function in a domestic setting before we discharged them.
Later on, we plan to add similar wards at Yusuf Dadoo Hospital on the West Rand, Kopanong in the Vaal and Germiston on the East Rand.
In addition, we have made real progress in introducing community based rehabilitation which extends the process after discharge form hospital. In four out of our five health regions we now have multidisciplinary teams in place, consisting of occupational therapists, speech therapists, physiotherapists and social workers.
The professional team will operate in clinics and community health centres, working closely with a group of rehabilitation assistants, who serve the areas closest to where they live. They are specially trained for this work at a non-professional level. At the moment, assistants from Katlehong, Daveyton, Westbury and parts of the West Rand are already at work.
Presently our capacity to train rehabilitation assistants is limited and this has been a factor in the relatively slow expansion of community based services.
Access to appropriate assistive devices is a fundamental feature of rehabilitation. In our context, sheer poverty has often stood in the way of disabled people obtaining devices that are as essential to their human existence as shelter or clothing.
This province now has a policy that no person in need of a wheelchair or hearing aid should be denied this simply because they cannot afford to make the usual financial payment.
This year, donor funding from the Flemish Government enabled the Gauteng Health Department to provide 255 wheelchairs and 214 hearing Aids free of charge to people in great financial need.
Gauteng also has the capacity to supply motorised wheelchairs where therapists at our hospitals recommend this as the appropriate form of assistance.
Technology
This year the national theme for the Day for the Disabled is Access to Appropriate Information and Technology.
The theme goes to the heart of establishing equal opportunities for the disabled minority. Ingenious technological solutions are available to extend the range of activities of people with disabilities - but for the poor these solutions are as remote as planet Mars.
For a physically disabled person living in a shack, with no fixed bath, no proper toilet, no electricity - and on a rutted dirt road - even the most affordable assistive devices are useless.
Poverty can safely be counted on to magnify any form of disability. Any strategy which ignores this plain and painful reality will fail to contribute to achieving the rights to which South Africans with disabilities are entitled.
Amos Masondo MEC for Health
Released by the Office of the MEC for Health. More information from: Popo Maja (082 373 1169)
FOR YOUR INFORMATION Guide to Services for People with Disabilities
The Gauteng Health Department's Directorate for Health Promotion & Communications, with help from a number of NGOs, has produced a guide to services for people with disabilities. The booklet, produced as part of this International Day's celebrations, is a response to the challenge for us to share the information we have as widely as possible. It is not an exhaustive directory. It is the first edition of a publication which (the Department hopes) will grow and grow...
Copies may be obtained after December 3 from Champa Gopal Telephone (011) 355-3244 or Monica Singh Telephone (011) 355-3236.
Submission of entries for the next edition can also be arranged with Ms Gopal.