Slindile Khanyile: Business Report,

STEVEN Friedman, director of the Centre for the Study of Democracy at the University of Johannesburg, said yesterday that there were serious problems with the current medical aid system in South Africa, which was both morally and economically unsustainable. Addressing the Board of Healthcare Funders (BHF) conference, Friedman said the country did not have a system that was able to adequately provide healthcare to millions of its citizens. He said South Africa had not created a free market where people were able to make the right choices because the industry was not simplified. Friedman said medical aids were not interested in people, but rather the bottom line, adding that he most disempowering tool of the medical aid was that it was impossible to make a choice on information provided. Responding to Friedman's criticism, Humphrey Zokufa, the managing director of the BHF, said: "We have to listen and don't dismiss what he said. As an industry, we assume what we are doing is right. It's a wake-up call for us, as we move forward."