{"id":407029,"date":"2020-06-11T14:22:08","date_gmt":"2020-06-11T12:22:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=407029"},"modified":"2020-06-11T14:22:08","modified_gmt":"2020-06-11T12:22:08","slug":"new-coronavirus-guidelines-for-medical-aids-in-south-africa","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/lifestyle\/407029\/new-coronavirus-guidelines-for-medical-aids-in-south-africa\/","title":{"rendered":"New coronavirus guidelines for medical aids in South Africa"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The Council for Medical Schemes (CMS) has published a new circular focusing on how Covid-19 should be covered by the country&#8217;s medical aids.<\/p>\n<p>The circular covers a range of issues including how Covid-19 is transmitted, the risk factors most prevalent in South Africans, the most common symptoms, how to manage children and pregnant mothers, and testing protocols.<\/p>\n<p>The circular also outlines which services do not fall under &#8216;PMB level of care&#8217; for Covid-19.<\/p>\n<p>Prescribed Minimum Benefits (PMB) are a set of defined benefits to ensure that all medical scheme members have access to certain minimum health services, regardless of the benefit option they have selected.<\/p>\n<p>The Council for Medical Schemes said that the following\u00a0is <strong>not recommended<\/strong> as PMB level of care:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Follow-up treatment and care for any person (symptomatic) who tests negative for Covid-19 (RT-PCR test);<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>Follow-up care for any person (asymptomatic) who tests negative for Covid-19 (RT-PCR test);<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>Routine RT-PCR testing of asymptomatic, unscreened and unreferred patients which turns out negative is based on scheme rules;<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>Routine preadmission (including elective admissions) RT-PCR testing for asymptomatic patients which turns out negative is based on scheme rules;<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>Personal protective equipment (PPE) is not currently recommended as PMB level of care;<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>Off-label medication is not PMB level of care;<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>Serological and point of care testing for COVID-19 is not currently PMB level of care;<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>Testing of asymptomatic people returning to work is not PMB level of care.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>The circular also notes that babies in good health, who are born from a Covid-19 infected mother do not need a Covid-19 test, and such testing is therefore not PMB level of care.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Unwell or symptomatic babies should have a Covid-19 test on day three of life if the case definition is met, or at another time if clinically indicated,&#8221; it said.<\/p>\n<p>You can read the full directive below.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/06\/PMB-June-2020.pdf\" width=\"100%\" height=\"600\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<hr \/>\n<p><strong>Read: <a href=\"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/trending\/406745\/heres-how-big-south-africas-coronavirus-test-backlog-is-nhls\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Here\u2019s how big South Africa\u2019s coronavirus test backlog is: NHLS<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Council for Medical Schemes (CMS) has published a new circular focusing on how Covid-19 should be covered by the country&#8217;s medical aids.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":205418,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9876],"tags":[26],"class_list":["post-407029","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-lifestyle","tag-headline"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/407029","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=407029"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/407029\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":407061,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/407029\/revisions\/407061"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/205418"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=407029"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=407029"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=407029"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}