With anti-migrant groups blocking foreign nationals from access, health facilities are becoming battlegrounds for exclusionary healthcare.

Young mother Faith Maphosa clutched her 10-day-old baby, hoping they would be let into the Rosettenville Community Health Centre in Johannesburg, where she had given birth just over a week earlier.

"I am hoping that they will eventually grow some compassion for my baby and let me in. I also require medical attention because I was operated on when I gave birth to the baby; but I will be okay even if they only check my baby's health," Maphosa, a Zimbabwean who stays in Rosettenville, said on Monday, 7 July.

She is one of many people who have been turned away from some healthcare facilities in Gauteng over the past few weeks by various anti-migrant groups, which broadly fall under the "Put South Africa First" banner - including Operation Dudula, the Patriotic Alliance (PA) and several smaller community groups.

The groups are demanding that South Africans be prioritised for economic opportunities and services, such as healthcare, over undocumented migrants, whom they want deported. They contend that foreign nationals are burdening the country's health system to the detriment of locals.

"They demanded proof of our...