Mail & Guardian
Mail & Guardian
groote schuur hospitallatest news & developments
In the Heart of Cape Town Museum at Groote Schuur Hospital, wax figurines recreate the first human-to-human heart transplant, performed by Christiaan Bernard. (Jay Caboz)
CAPE TOWN

Anatomy of a hospital: Groote Schuur in a time of budget and staffing cuts

From porters to engineers, hospital staff navigate chronic underfunding and staffing shortages while maintaining world-class care at one of South Africa’s most storied medical…

  • Sean Christie
18 min read
Out for the count: A team from Statistics South Africa counts the transient population as the 2022 census kicks off with census night in Marabastad, Pretoria, on 2 February. (Alet Pretorius/Gallo Images)
2022 CENSUS

2022 census discriminates against LGBTQIA+ community

LGBTQIA+ organisations have accused Stats SA of being discriminatory for excluding transgender, non-binary and intersex categories in a question relating to sex

  • Cassandra Roxburgh
7 min read
Hospital admissions in Africa have increased by 67% during the period but the bed occupancy rate for intensive care units remains low at 7.5%, with 14% of the patients receiving supplemental oxygen. (Photo by Sergei SavostyanovTASS via Getty Images)
DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH

Data shows there’s a higher risk of landing up in ICU or dying if you’re not vaccinated

The effectiveness of Covid-19 vaccines is becoming clear from the difference in the number of people admitted to hospital between those who have received at least one vaccine…

  • Marcia Zali
4 min read
‘Although I am aware that we may live in a world full of myths
BODY LANGUAGE

We need our foreign doctors

Yet these skilled professionals are discriminated against by their colleagues

  • Palesa Lebitse
4 min read
Not all transgender people feel the need to undergo gender-affirming treatment. But for those who do, the incongruence between their physical and real genders can lead to gender dysphoria — a conflict between their physical gender and the gender with which they identify. (John McCann/M&G)
BODY LANGUAGE

Trans people have regrets too

The uproar over research about those who rue having a surgical transition obscures real issues

  • Palesa Lebitse
4 min read
Waiting game: Groote Schuur’s Dr Kevin Adams is the only surgeon in the country who can craft a penis from vaginal tissue.
GENDER AFFIRMING SURGERY

‘Ambassadors’ for trans surgery rally for better services

The inaccessibility to gender-affirming surgery is discouraging to transgender people seeking these services

  • Carl Collison
5 min read
CAPE TOWN

Memories of a human heart

The museum — small, intimate and in the very spot where it all took place — remembers the man, the remarkable history of heart transplant surgery.

  • Leonie Joubert
4 min read
CAPE TOWN

Heart surgeon pleads for research support from govt

A leading South African heart surgeon pleaded on Monday, the 40th anniversary of the world’s first heart transplant, for more government support for medical research. Professor…

  • Ben Maclennan
2 min read