Gauteng health will strive to retain critical staff hired on Covid contracts

The Gauteng health department says it will use the R600m allocated to the Covid-19 compensation of employees budget to “retain as many of the critical contract staff as possible”.

Professional and support staff including about 113 medical personnel were contracted for 12 months. Their contacts end on March 31.

Health and wellness MEC Nomantu Nkomo-Ralehoko, during an oral response in a sitting of the provincial legislature on Tuesday, said hospitals have been asked to submit their needs according to prioritisation.

“The appointments will be based on critical, prioritised and urgent service needs at each facility based on the budget allocated.”

This comes as the budget was trimmed.

Nkomo-Ralehoko said her department had asked the provincial budget committee to retain the current Covid-19 Compensation of Employees budget of R1.1bn.

“However, an amount of R600m has since been allocated for the 2023/24 financial year.”

“Considering the reduction of the current budget and the competing priorities across service centres, there is a need to reprioritise the capacity requirements to optimise the limited resources.

“There is an agreement on the prioritisation of clinical posts across all hospitals and the process to advertise available posts in line with the allocated budget. The process will be fast-tracked so as not to negatively impact on the facilities.”

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