At the SAMED 36th AGM, held on 18 May 2023, members came together to celebrate the Association’s work, engage with the SAMED leadership and secretariat and hear from key stakeholders from our broader sector.
Standing in for the Minister of Health, Dr Sandile Buthelezi, Director General (DG) of Health addressed SAMED members in his keynote as essential partners in healthcare. He commended SAMED on our involvement and support of the Department including assisting with candidate appointments for the medtech Health Technology Assessments unit under NHI.
He committed his department to looking into and where necessary escalating key medtech concerns including outstanding public sector debt, Project 18C (which aims to have industry codes recognised by the Minister of Health) and working across government departments to enable and prioritise medtech localisation. The DG told members of plans to have a task group, much like the Department had under COVID-19, that would strategically lead National Health Insurance (NHI) progress and implementation. He said that SAMED would have a seat within this task group.
SAMED members also voted on the revised Constitution which was adopted and confirmed at the AGM. Members also voted on 6 elected Board members. Please join us in congratulating the below candidates on their positions (for a period of two years) on the SAMED Board.
Avanthi Govender Bester
Associate Director – Regulatory Affairs and Quality
Alcon
Marlon Burgess
Country Manager
GE Healthcare
Merilynn Steenkamp
General Manager: Southern Africa
Roche Diagnostics
Monica Lucas
General Manager
Werkomed
Peter Mehlape
Managing Director: Southern Africa
Medtronic
Reiner Gabler
Managing Director
Gabler Medical
Honorary Membership
Rob Millar, who was a founding member of SAMED in 1985, was also conferred with honorary membership to SAMED. An “honorary member” by definition in our constitution is a person who, in the opinion of the Board, has rendered exceptionally valuable or exemplary services to SAMED or the medical devices industry and has been granted honorary membership by the Board.
Rob Millar has over 45 years’ experience in the Southern African Healthcare market covering pharmaceuticals and medical technology including consumables, specialized and capital equipment products. Due to this long-standing commitment, not only to SAMED, but to medtech more broadly. I would like to, on behalf of SAMED and the Board, confer on Rob honorary membership.
Office Bearers
At the 19 May 2023 SAMED Board meeting, Peter Mehlape was re-elected as SAMED Chairperson, Dave Roberts as Vice Chair and Reiner Gabler as Treasurer for a period of 2 years.
The Board also elected the Executive Committee (Exco) who will serve in steering the operational functionalities of SAMED. The aforementioned office bearers together with Donata Kubheka (Medtronic), Monica Lucas (Werkomed and Neil Venter (SA Biomedical) will make up the SAMED Exco.
We look forward to their leadership as we continue an upward trajectory for our association and industry.
