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By Trend

The South African government has agreed how much it will pay private hospitals and medical practitioners to treat severely ill COVID-19 patients if public hospitals run out of space, a senior health official said, Trend reports citing Reuters.

The government has been in talks for months with private firms and medical associations ahead of a probable scenario where public hospitals run out of critical care beds.

Agreement has been reached on a daily fee of up to 16,000 rand ($950) for COVID-19 patients that get treated in critical care beds in private hospitals, said Anban Pillay, the health ministry’s deputy director-general for national health insurance.

The fee includes the cost of using the bed, paying a team of specialists to treat the patient and additional services including pathology and radiology.

Now that high-level terms have been agreed with the private sector, health departments in the country’s nine provinces will sign “service-level” agreements, Pillay said.

Estimates vary widely as to how many critical care beds there are in the country.

A ministry presentation in April put the total at around 3,300, with two-thirds of those in the private sector. Healthcare provider Netcare estimates there are some 6,000 beds, with around 3,800 in private hospitals.