Publications
HST provides free electronic access to over 500 health systems research related reports, publications and papers. Close to 300 of these are publications that have been commissioned and funded by the Trust. Topics include among others district systems development, drug supply management, human resource development, informatics, legislation, finance, environmental health, mental health, lessons learnt, nutrition and sexually transmitted diseases / HIV/AIDS. The main publication of the HST is the annual South African Health Review. From 2005 all HST publications will be available in low resolution only. To explore the range of publications HST offers use the Advanced search to search using a variety of criteria.

Independent researchers probing South Africas cholera epidemic have blasted the government over water schemes which threaten the lives of the rural poor.

Just weeks before the cholera epidemic in Kwa Zulu - Natal in August 2000, many rural women were begging for tap water at the homes of their richer neighbours, according to researchers Edward Cottle and Hameda Deedat.

The situation arose because the government had sanctioned a new cost-effective rural water supply scheme, which effectively left thousands of people without free communal tap water.

The communal taps were installed by the then KwaZulu homeland government 17 years ago as an emergency measure to combat cholera outbreaks in the rural Madlebe district.

The claims are made by Cottle and Deedat in a new report summarising an 18-month investigation which attempts to pinpoint the root causes of the cholera epidemic, which has claimed the lives of at least 260 people country wide.