South Africa: A Fungal Infection That Targets the Brain Claims Many Lives in SA, Stopping It Won't Be Easy

One of the top killers of people living with HIV in South Africa is a fungal infection. In this Spotlight special briefing, we unpack what we know about this dangerous disease… Read more »

South Africa: Can SA's New Director-General for Health Turn Around a Struggling Department?

Dr Thembisile Xulu is South Africa's sixth permanent Director-General of health since the dawn of democracy. How will she measure up against her predecessors? Read more »

South Africa: Exploited and Exhausted, South Africa's Ghost Doctors Start to Rattle Their Chains

For years, hospitals have relied on the unpaid, unprotected labour of trainee-specialists to fill their rosters, but these doctors are reaching a breaking point. Read more »

South Africa: 'This One Was Brought By God Himself' - the Doctor Helping People See Again in Rural KZN

As a young doctor working in rural KwaZulu-Natal, Hennie Hamilton lived with a Zulu family for four years, an experience which, he says, changed him forever. Twenty-three years… Read more »

South Africa: This Specialist Forensic Nurse in Germiston Helped Put a Serial Rapist Behind Bars

In a country like South Africa which grapples with a high prevalence of gender-based violence, forensic nursing unfortunately remains a largely overlooked specialisation, with… Read more »

South Africa: With Over 3,600 Western Cape Users, Lenacapavir Is 'Cool'

From counselling about small nodules to overcoming people's fears of needles, Spotlight takes the pulse of a new HIV prevention injection's rollout in the Western Cape. Read more »

South Africa: South Africa Is One Step Closer to a New TB Vaccine, but There Is a Lot of Work Ahead

In March 2024, a pivotal clinical trial was launched to evaluate what might well become the first new tuberculosis vaccine on the market in more than a century. As anticipation… Read more »

South Africa: Some Pharmacists Can Now Apply for Permits to Provide HIV Prevention Pills Without a Doctor's Script

Ten months after an enabling court judgment, some pharmacists in South Africa can finally start applying for permits that allows them to dispense HIV prevention pills without a… Read more »

South Africa: What Are Broadly Neutralising Antibodies and What Do They Mean for the Fight Against HIV?

HIV is known for its ability to outsmart our immune system's normal defences. A small number of people living with the virus are however able to generate unusually effective immune… Read more »

South Africa: The Woman Caring for Cape Town's Homeless Once Numbed Her Own Pain With Opioids

With glimmers of tenderness beneath a stoic façade, Tara Gerardy-Bissolati tells Spotlight about her struggle to beat opioids, why homelessness is a public health issue, and… Read more »

South Africa: This World-Class Scientist From Cape Town Used to Cut Up Her Dolls and Perform Imaginary Transplant Surgeries

Long before she became a pioneering scientist, Professor Liesl Zühlke insisted on seeing her tonsils after they were removed when she was just five years old. Today,… Read more »

South Africa: Inside the Box With Dr Andy Gray | Are Complementary Medicines Effectively Regulated in South Africa?

The regulation of complementary and alternative medicines in South Africa has been hotly contested in recent decades, including in court rooms. In his latest column for Spotlight,… Read more »

South Africa: Marlene Le Roux - 'I'm a Disabled Woman, Look Me in the Eye'

High-octane executive force Marlene le Roux tells Spotlight about contracting polio when she was three months old, about not dimming her light, and renovations that made the… Read more »

South Africa: Closing the Gap Is Not Enough for Children Born With Cleft Lip or Cleft Palate

Every three minutes, a child with a cleft lip or cleft palate is born somewhere in the world. While surgery can repair this, Kholofelo Mphahlele argues that the real measure of… Read more »

South Africa: Dr Hermann Reuter Says the Biggest Battle After HIV in SA Is Addiction - and It Is Being Ignored

Dr Hermann Reuter did pioneering work treating HIV in the early 2000s in Cape Town and in the rural Eastern Cape. Today, his focus is substance abuse, which he believes is the… Read more »

South Africa: Reforming Prescribed Minimum Benefits Is the First Step to Affordable Medical Cover

With plans in motion to roll out universal health coverage in South Africa, Dr Katlego Mothudi, of the Board of Healthcare Funders, argues that revising the compulsory prescribed… Read more »

South Africa: People With HIV Are Living Longer but Have Fewer Years of Good Health, New Guidelines Aim to Change That

South Africa has an ageing population of people living with HIV. For the first time, a set of clinical guidelines maps out a framework to help keep this group of people healthier… Read more »

Africa: Aids 2026 - Some Pieces Falling Into Place for Monthly HIV Prevention Pill, but Key Data Not Yet in

If an HIV prevention pill that provides a month of protection at a time performs well in two ongoing clinical trials, it could become the next big thing in HIV prevention after the… Read more »

South Africa: Positive Interim Findings On New Once-Weekly HIV Treatment Pill

A new antiretroviral combination pill that is taken only once a week appears to work as well as daily pills at treating HIV. This is according to interim study findings to be… Read more »

South Africa: When Medicines Are Made Outside the Factory - Why Pharmacovigilance Matters More Than Ever

A high-profile court case has thrust the legalities of compounding medicines in South Africa into the spotlight. Behind the immediate legal issues hide a series of unresolved… Read more »

South Africa: 'At the Clinic ... You Can Feel Them Staring' - How Specialised Services Are Helping Trans People in George

In the Western Cape's second largest city, an NGO offers safe, private HIV services to men who have sex with men and transgender people. Spotlight met with some of the people using… Read more »

South Africa: 'My Kids Will Never Struggle Like I Did' - How One Doctor's Vision Opened Doors for Hundreds of Rural Healthcare Workers

Dr Andrew Ross's idea of sponsoring rural students to study for careers in healthcare has succeeded beyond his dreams. Sue Segar sat down with him and chatted to the four students… Read more »

South Africa: From Test Tubes to Treatment - Two TB Researchers On Getting the Ancient Disease Themselves

Being a researcher who studies tuberculosis in the lab is one thing, having the TB bug in your lungs is quite another. Spotlight sat down with two of a relatively small number of… Read more »

South Africa: To Make Pimart Work We Need to Plan - We Should Focus On These Three P's

Eight months after the Supreme Court of Appeal gave the green light for specially trained pharmacists to dispense antiretrovirals without a script from a doctor, the programme… Read more »

South Africa: We Have Three Spheres of Government, Which Is Responsible for Providing Primary Healthcare Services?

A court battle over blocked access to Johannesburg clinics has exposed how responsibility for ensuring access to healthcare services is divided between national, provincial and… Read more »