PETITION FOR COUNCIL FOR MEDICAL SCHEMES TO REPEAL CIRCULAR 80 AND 82 0F 2019

The Healthcare Stakeholders Forum needs you to sign this petition to stop CMS from discontinuing low cost medical cover. 

On the 04th of December 2019, CMS (Council for Medical Schemes) issued Circular 80 and 82 of 2019, it served to inform all affected parties that Low-Cost Medical Insurance and Low-Cost Benefits Options (LCBO) will be outlawed effective 31 March thus leaving just over 2 million people without affordable healthcare cover. No alternative has been offered to date.  The result will be that members, usually from low-income communities, will be negatively impacted as they will have no other option for cover except to rely on State Healthcare facilities which are already over burdened.

CMS's circular 80 and 82 are intended to revoke and destroy affordable medical cover options currently offered and available in the market. We believe that CMS circular 80 and 82 plans to close down low cost medical cover does not align with the government's policies on transformation; and the government’s objective to protect the rights of patients and service providers to access and provide affordable healthcare.

We believe that the circulars need to be scrapped, and reversed due to the impact on both the individuals, communities and the already burdened public health care system. We demand and reject the CMS’s decisions to deprive the poor access to low cost medical healthcare. The circular is unconstitutional and is rattled with many issues regarding following due process and here are the reasons: 

 a.       We question the legitimacy of the Circular; the instruction to stop providing medical LCBO and similar products has not followed due process.  Circular 80 and 82 of 2019 failed to align with an amendment to the Long Term and Short-Term Insurance Act, Medical Scheme Act which must be done to remove an option that has been guaranteed in previous Bills.

 b.        We also reject the ridiculously short timeframe granted for disallowing the LCBO products based on the Demarcation Exemption Framework and/or the MS Act beyond 2021, timeline which is less than a year from now. South Africans are faced with a crippling Covid-19 pandemic, amidst all of this the circular makes it impossible to ensure that members will have access to critically needed healthcare products and services during the pandemic and post March 2021.

c.        CMS must reverse Circular 80 and until all affected parties have been properly consulted on the way forward. Circular 80 hinders transformation and denies the new provider entrants an opportunity to participate in the sector.

 d.         We call on the CMS to prioritise transformation on ownership, employment equity and management in line with BBBEE codes to broaden participation in the sector and creating access to training and opportunities for communities.

Please sign the Petition and support the campaign to reverse CMS circular 80 and 82 imposed on the medical LCBO sector.
 
* The HSF (Healthcare Stakeholders Forum) is a non-partisan advocacy group that consists of, civic organizations that are at the forefront of fighting for the rights and dignity of the poor and marginalized, as well as BBBEE compliant LCBO service providers.