Refusing to pay for a back opeation

My mom is 73 years old and is suffering from compression of the spine. She is in excruciating pain all the time. She's on 2 X Schedule 6 pain tablets and 2 X 2 Schedule 5 pain tablets daily and it does not help. Sizwe doesn't pay for the medication either. She has been on cortisone injections and morphine patches and they don't help. Not paid by Sizwe either. They have acknowledged that it is compression of the spine as specified in a MRI lumbar report, which is a PMB condition (941A), and they still refuse to pay for the operation. How is it that Sizwe Medical Aid can simply refuse to treat a PMB condition? She is deteriorating fast now, has got asthma again, her legs are swollen and she can hardly walk anymore. Some days she is confused. It's not life threatening!!!!!! I don't know what has to happen before they will pay for the operation, maybe she must be dead before it's considered life-threatening.