Occupational Health Barriers in South Africa: A Call for Ubuntu
Muzimkhulu Zungu, Jerry Spiegel, Annalee Yassi, Dingani Moyo, Kuku Voyi

TL;DR
This paper explores how the South African philosophy of Ubuntu can help address challenges in occupational health services for public health workers, especially in low- and middle-income countries.
Contribution
The paper introduces Ubuntu as a novel framework to improve occupational health service implementation and sustainability in public health systems.
Findings
Occupational health challenges in LMICs include poor leadership and overworked professionals.
Ubuntu offers a cultural approach to strengthen collaboration and sustainability in OH services.
The absence of Ubuntu contributes to ineffective OH service implementation during crises like the pandemic.
Abstract
Many low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) grapple with shortages of health workers, a crucial component of robust health systems. The COVID-19 pandemic underscored the imperative for appropriate staffing of health systems and the occupational health (OH) threats to health workers. Issues related to accessibility, coverage, and utilization of OH services in public sector health facilities within LMICs were particularly accentuated during the pandemic. This paper draws on the observations and experiences of researchers engaged in an international collaboration to consider how the South African concept of Ubuntu provides a promising way to understand and address the challenges encountered in establishing and sustaining OH services in public sector health facilities. Throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, the collaborators actively participated in implementing and studying OH and infection…
Genes, proteins, chemicals, diseases, species, mutations and cell lines named across the full text — each resolved to its canonical identifier and authoritative record.
Peer Reviews
No public reviews on file for this paper yet. If you reviewed it on a platform where reviews are public (OpenReview, ICLR, NeurIPS, ICML), you can paste yours below so the community can read it here.
Videos
No videos yet. Explain this paper in a talk, walkthrough, or lecture? Add one.
Taxonomy
TopicsOccupational Health and Safety Research · Environmental and Social Impact Assessments · HIV/AIDS Impact and Responses
