Health Minister accused of downplaying crisis at Bustamante Hospital for Children

By Clinton McGregor    

 

The parliamentary opposition says there is a major crisis at the Bustamante Hospital for Children and is accusing the Health Minister Dr. Christopher Tufton of seeking to downplay the situation.

 

The Health Minister was forced to call a press briefing on Thursday following claims that life-saving surgeries were being delayed due to problems with the air conditioning unit in the operating theatre.

 

Dr. Tufton emphasized the need for better maintenance of the equipment at hospitals to alleviate the issue.

 

But speaking with members of the media, on Thursday evening, Opposition Spokesman on Health Dr. Alfred Dawes accused the minister of minimising the extent of the crisis at the children's hospital.

 

"It's a performance in crisis management because all that came out of it was a very deliberate attempt to kill the story by trying to say that the little girl is going to get her surgery done, a lot of blame shifting as to why we got here, and that's the end of it. But there are deep-rooted issues at the Bustamante Hospital that need to be addressed because it's not just one person who will be facilitated at the University Hospital, who has been affected. There are many children out there who are suffering because of the dilapidated state of the operating theatre, and until we address those issues we're going to continue to see cases like this popping up from time to time," argued Dr. Dawes. 

 

The issue came to light after it was revealed that Bustamante Hospital postponed a critical surgery for a child due to challenges with the operating theatre.

 

Dr. Tufton called a press briefing hours after the Gleaner published a report on the situation, informing the media that the University Hospital of the West Indies had consented to make an operating theatre, equipment and supporting staff available for the surgery to be done. However, a timeline was not given for when the surgery will be undertaken.

 

In the meantime, Dr. Dawes also accused the Ministry of Health of stocking the island's hospitals with cheap equipment, saying this is contributing to the maintenance crisis. 

 

"So do not listen to the sweet talk about equipment being bought and how much money is being spent. For one, we are overpaying for a lot of these equipment. And I'll say it quite frankly, there are a lot of hustlers out there who just buy cheap equipment from China, sell it to the Ministry of Health and they're deployed in hospitals. They do not know anything at all about maintaining these equipment. You cannot get the parts for them and because they're just hustlers, they don't have an organised arrangement with the manufacturers to service these equipment. So naturally the equipment are going to go down," the opposition spokesman contended.