Museum of Art
Dignified Healthcare at the Alexandra Health Centre and University Clinic
Michael Goldblatt, Maternal and Family Care at Clinic, ca. 1992 silver gelatin print
Taken during a period of political violence before the first democratic elections of 1994, the photograph at top depicts a family receiving care inside the Alexandra Health Centre and University Clinic (AHC). The mother and children, side by side at the worst of times, hint at a practice that set the AHC apart from many other apartheid-era healthcare facilities: its commitment to dignified care. The AHC employed a model of holistic, community-based primary healthcare. Through a series of infrastructure and facility improvements and educational programs, the clinic aimed to treat not only its individual patients, but the community of Alexandra Township as a whole. One of the main areas of the AHC’s work was maternal care, including midwifery, pre- and post-natal checkups, sexual education, the construction of updated maternal wards, and other initiatives aimed at ensuring the dignity and privacy of mothers.
Elliot Werner ’29
Scroll down to read additional material gathered by Elliot Werner ’29 as part of class work for After Apartheid: History and Identity in Contemporary South Africa, Spring 2026.
Additional Materials
Alex Clinic’s Mission Statement:
- To develop comprehensive health care to and with the people of Alexandra.
- To develop services and staff structures that are appropriate to urban Primary Health Care in South Africa, both now and in the future.
- To develop ways in which staff and community members can together plan, run and evaluate these services.
- To train staff, students and community members in pursuit of these three goals.
Alexandra Health Centre and University Clinic, Alexandra Health Centre and University Clinic 60th Annual Report.
Testimony
Dr. Paulo Ferrinho, who worked at Alex Clinic between 1985 and 1992, on their community healthcare model:
On a very personal level, it was very satisfying. It was very satisfying to work in an environment where the relationship between different groups of [people] was very horizontal… There was no loss of respect… It was that [experience] that made me believe very strongly all my life… [in this] multicultural context that which I found so important
Paulo Ferrinho, Interview by David Gordon. April 28th, 2026
