SABC News reports that the Democratic Nursing Organisation of South Africa (DENOSA) in Gauteng has condemned austerity measures imposed by the National Treasury over a year ago, freezing the hiring of new employees except for instances where offers of employment have gone out already and to hire only critical employees if the heads of department submit motivations.

DENOSA Gauteng chairperson, Simphiwe Gada has called on the Treasury as well as the Premier of Gauteng Panyaza Lesufi to give bureaucracy to hospital officials to appoint and dismiss staff. “Since last year we have seen austerity measures that have been imposed especially on support on staff posts, such as your cleaners, clerks and all that, especially in Gauteng health and these things affect service delivery. We want to call on National Treasury, we also want to call on the premier to decentralize and give back the hospitals as well as the departments its powers in terms of appointing.”

Gada has emphasised the need for the current infrastructure overview of hospitals in the country. Gada says hospitals are in tatters. “We think that if we do not fix the infrastructure challenges in health as a priority or we declare them as a disaster and we establish a fund that must look into ensuring that all health facilities in the country that are old must receive a set-aside budget that is going to address the health challenges because we all know that these hospitals are old, many clinics are old, you go to the Eastern Cape you go to KZN everywhere.”