UNC: Audit PoS hospital

On Thursday, Health Minister Jerry Narace announced that the board of the NWRHA had sent chief executive officer Agatha Carrington on leave while the report from Ernst & Young was completed.

In a statement, UNC Caroni East MP Dr Tim Gopeesingh, a former chairman of the NWRHA, referred to the findings of the Commission of Inquiry into the Operations and Delivery of Public Health Care Services in 2007. He cited page 19 of Volume One in which the commission listed areas of special concern and stated “in the course of the investigations, the commission found there is evidence of corruption or other malfeasance.” Gopeesingh said among the several findings was: the need for investigation of allegations of corruption, nepotism and mismanagement, and a forensic audit of the five RHAs. “The audit should be conducted in conjunction with the Auditor General’s Department.”

Gopeesingh said it was “a damning indictment on the failure of the Minister of Health and the Government” to still undertake and implement forensic audits not only at the NWRHA and all regional health authorities more than two years after the report was laid in Parliament. Gopeesingh said, “It is extremely unacceptable that it took the Minister of Health two years to begin an investigation into serious malfeasance, corruption, nepotism, incompetence and mismanagement in the health sector.”

He said scores of innocent children and adults have lost their lives and there was serious emotional and psychological distress caused by improper and inadequate care.

The UNC called for Narace for the reports/audits from Ernst & Young to be made public via the Parliament to prevent further loss of lives.

Narace was asked on Thursday if the Ernst & Young findings was evidence that no action had been taken since the commission’s report. “All of these things are continuation of that work. You have to examine the processes and make recommendations and there are a number of other things we have done,” he said.

Dr Petronella Manning-Alleyne, consultant at the Neonatal Unit of the Port-of-Spain General Hospital, who gave testimony during the inquiry calling attention to questionable tendering procedures in the NWRHA expressed surprise at the events unfolding. “It is passing strange. The CEO sent on leave. There was an inference. Somehow I don’t find that is fair. We are talking of someone’s professional integrity.” She said there have been improvements in the system since the commission’s report. Manning-Alleyne said she did not know what was happening with the current audit but will await to see how things turn out.