Police shunted like sacks of yam

THE EDITOR: Some questions for the public to ponder, as the police try to curb crime. In what other so-called civilised nation, do police officers, wounded in the line of duty, get driven from pillar to post seeking medical care for gunshot wounds? Are Trinbagonians satisfied with the quality of medical care given in any emergency situation? Do people realise that they take their lives into their hands each time they leave their front door, and could bleed to death due to neglect of a small wound?

What good then, does it do the people of TT to have a fantastic two days of Carnival, with many visitors enjoying themselves, if basic emergency care for the public, including wounded police officers, is so lacking? When Andre Tanker died for lack of $400 last year, I thought the nation would have been shocked enough to pass legislation requiring mandatory emergency care at the nearest facility, private or public, to critical care cases — breathing difficulties, heart attacks, accident injuries, choking and gunshot wounds as well as others. We lamented, we sighed, we tut-tutted and nothing changed. What if the President of the Republic was involved in a vehicular accident? Would his status guarantee him emergency care at the nearest facility, or does he have to walk around with a credit card with thousands of dollars on it as “just in case” insurance?

Well, His Excellency is a valuable person, but he is no more human than anyone else. Each day, airlines from Europe, North America, South America and the Caribbean arrive bringing business people, tourists and returnees from places where trauma care is available in metropolitan areas, and life-flight helicopters can shunt critical care patients to where the care is available from more rural areas. We copy nonsense from those places, fashionable nonsense. Could we not also copy some health provisions? The concept of emergency care, required by law, at every hospital, public or private, is an idea that is quite feasible for TT, given our size, money resources, and highly educated people.

We continue to allow people to languish in limbo of shunting back and forth, as if they were misplaced sacks of potatoes or yam. Each region of the country needs a trauma care facility for emergencies. Final question: Why should policemen put their lives on the line to defend a nation that does not look to their needs when they are hurt in the line of duty? The Downtown Merchants Association, the Chambers of Commerce, and all service organisations need to work with the Ministry of Health to say that people are valuable, all people of TT, even a wounded criminal. The picture currently painted is a sorry one indeed.

LINDA EDWARDS
Port-of-Spain