KwaZulu-Natal will receive nine new clinics and two community health centres (CHC) with the provincial health department's latest budget.

Tabling the budget in the KZN legislature on Wednesday, Health MEC Nomagugu Simelane said the construction plans were being finalised and building was likely to start in August.

One of the CHCs will be in the eThekwini district and will cater for the Mbumbulu community and surrounding areas, and the second one will be in the Mtubatuba municipality.

Simelane said the new buildings were in addition to plans to upgrade four rural district hospitals.

The upgrades will ensure they "offer a higher, regional-level package of services, including specialised care", she said.

The hospitals are the Vryheid, Dundee, Bethesda, and Christ the King hospitals.

"We could not continue as though it is normal for people in rural areas to be deprived of these much-needed specialised healthcare services just because of their geographical location," she said.

The upgrade plans were announced three years ago, but were derailed by the emergence of Covid–19. However, the projects are back on track and the condition assessments on all four hospitals were completed in October, Simelane said.

The upgrade will see beds at Bethesda Hospital increase from 200 to 300, and from 210 to 300 at Christ the King Hospital. Dundee Hospital will receive an extra 66 beds, bringing the total to 270 beds, and Vryheid Hospital's beds will increase from 338 to 540.

In addition, the provincial health department will upgrade the eDumbe CHC to a district hospital this year.

Simelane said the department's plans to build a tertiary hospital in the north of the province were "gathering momentum". She said assessments and investigations on the development of the business case for a new tertiary hospital had been completed.

"The business case was finalised and submitted to the national Department of Health in February 2023 and is currently under review. Once we get the approval, we will proceed with the procurement of the design team. We anticipate that the procurement process for the appointment of consultants will commence in the second quarter of the 2023/24 financial year," Simelane said.

"All of these infrastructural investments will ultimately ensure that our fellow compatriots who reside in far-flung areas of this province will no longer have to travel hundreds of kilometres and sleep far away from home just to see a medical specialist for 10 minutes, as it sometimes happens," she said.

Simelane added that the provincial department would invest in energy alternatives at healthcare centres.

"Unfortunately, when you lose energy, it affects not only hospitals and patients, but also the investments that have been made in our health technology equipment. Therefore, we have decided to implement various alternative energy sources in our different facilities."

"What we install in the facilities will be determined by the energy demand, as well as the rate of utilisation in that facility. In clinics that have not bought generators, we'll be sourcing inverters and solar panels. In hospitals, we'll be using a hybrid system involving generators, inverters and solar panels," she said.

The department has received an incentive grant from the national government of more than R78-million, Simelane said, for its infrastructure development score.