Profiles

By all accounts, Hasina Subedar is who you call when you need to roll out, well, anything new in public health. Known for her grit, grace and humour, the non-conformist middle child from Pietermaritzburg started out as a nurse 30 years ago. She is now responsible for getting the game-changer medication for HIV prevention into 360 clinics around the country.

Norbert Ndjeka was born on World TB Day. Decades later, he would reshape how South Africa treats the deadliest forms of the disease.

From porters to engineers, hospital staff navigate chronic underfunding and staffing shortages while maintaining world-class care at one of South Africa's most storied medical institutions.

From discontinued insulin pens to overpriced TB drugs, meet the young South African holding drug makers to account on behalf of patients.

Ndiviwe Mphothulo started in politics at the age of 12 in Soweto, where he was born with activism in his bloodline. Now, a medical doctor and the president of the Southern African HIV Clinicians Society, he’s trying to make sure the Trump administration’s funding cuts don’t collapse South Africa’s HIV programmes.

Francois Venter, a big rock climber, once drank tequila with the PhD-holding virologist rockstar Dexter Holland of The Offspring and, more recently, publicly excoriated both the president and the health minister for their inaction on the HIV funding crises. As Sean Christie quickly learned, that’s just how one of the country’s top HIV researchers rolls.

In her nearly 30 years in public healthcare, Rolene Wagner has risen to lead an institution that many had given up on: the debt-wracked, conflict-ridden Eastern Cape department of health. Her upbringing has custom-suited her to the task.

Yogan Pillay has worked under every health minister since 1994, making him the ultimate healthcare insider. Now he’s an outsider, but one with tremendous influence. Sean Christie visited him at home in Pretoria to hear what he’s been up to.

Zane Wilson founded the South African Depression and Anxiety Group (Sadag) in 1994, in the midst of her own debilitating struggle with panic disorder. Thirty years later, the group is the largest and most impactful mental health organisation in South Africa. Bhekisisa’s Sean Christie found Wilson and several of Sadag’s staff in a proud and reflective mood.

When our profile writer, Sean Christie, asked Aaron Motsoaledi for a form of life story share, South Africa’s health minister responded with a swift biographical flyover. But Christie was more interested in a sense of the experiences that lie behind the bullet points, both good and bad.

Mzulungile Nodikida, Sanele Madela, Bongile Mabilane, Nhlakanipho Gumede and Godisamang Kegakilwe have one thing in common: they studied medicine in Cuba.Since its establishment in...

In February, Mzulungile Nodikida stepped into the top seat at the South African Medical Association. He tells Sean Christie how he went from playing soccer and cricket while at school in the Eastern Cape to studying medicine in Cuba — and how his career path moved from seeing patients every day to steering an organisation that stands for “uniting doctors for the health of the nation”.

In 2016, when renowned South African cardiologist Ntobeko Ntusi stepped into the role as head and chair of the University of Cape Town’s (UCT) department of medicine, he took on both responsibilities and a legacy that most would have baulked at, amidst much scrutiny. He spoke to Sean Christie about his life’s trajectory, shortly before he joins the South African Medical Research Council as its new president and CEO.

At a conference towards the end of last year, some of the great names in African public healthcare shared their lessons about what can — and can’t — work on the continent, from setting up new hospitals to implementing national health insurance. Sean Christie was there.

In July, Rudo Mathivha handed in her notice at Chris Hani Baragwanath Academic Hospital, ending a rightly celebrated 25-year stint as head of the intensive care unit. It was after a truly terrible year. Her story underscores the extent to which quality healthcare for the country’s most vulnerable people remains at the mercy of the indifferent and the corrupt.

In 1969, Esther Mwaikambo became Tanzania’s first female doctor. Today, she is arguably also the country’s most famous. She tells Sean Christie how public healthcare in Africa has changed — and what she wishes for the future.