Cape Town - An extra R100 million has been allocated to the Department of Health to help fight HIV and Aids while provinces are to get more funding to help build new schools, says the Minister of Finance, Pravin Gordhan.
Presenting his Medium Term Budget Policy Statement in Parliament, Gordhan said government would continue to spend on its priorities- namely to create more jobs, invest in infrastructure, education and skills and improve health care.
He said spending would focus on the government's 12 outcomes and added that the outcomes had already influenced budgeting and planning in the 2011/12 budget cycle.
Of the R100 million to be spent on HIV and Aids prevention, R40 million will be allocated to the comprehensive HIV and Aids grant to provinces to increase male circumcision services.
The R100 million will form part of the R1.5 billion set aside for the years 2010 to 2013 to fight HIV and Aids.
More than 300 000 people are added to government's antiretroviral programmes each year and this is expected to increase to 400 000 in the next three years.
Gordhan also announced that additional funding would be set aside to replace informal and unsafe school buildings, and to eradicate infrastructure backlogs in 3 627 schools by 2014.
The funding forms part of the R10.3 billion government has assigned provinces for health and educational spending, between 2011 and 2013, and will complement the R40 billion that has already been allocated to school infrastructure.
In the health care sector, government has prioritised funds to filling important posts, including medical registrars in obstetrics and paediatrics and to recapitalise nursing colleges.
In preparation of the National Health Insurance, the government has proposed the introduction of amendments to improve the fairness of the tax treatment of medical aid contributions.
Gordhan said further work would be done to calculate the costing of the National Health Insurance and added that until more calculations were made, there would not be any move to raise taxes to fund the new health insurance system.
He said government was considering piloting improved family health care as part of an enhanced primary care system, including district-based contracts with independent general practitioners.
It is also considering making bulk purchases of medicines to bring down the cost of purchasing medication.
Also under consideration was a proposal to get private hospitals and academic institutions to partner with one another to train doctors and nurses, as well as another to help bring private-sector management into the delivery of public health care.
A project with the Development Bank of Southern Africa (DBSA) has been proposed to support education infrastructure investment. It is also hoped that the number of qualified teachers will be increased through the Funza Lushaka bursary programme.
