I refer to Franco Mercieca’s article Mismanaging Health Service (May 6) where he states “the much-acclaimed electoral promise of the primary healthcare reform has never left the drawing board due to customary internal squabbles within GonziPN, that will go down in history books as the main characteristic of this legislature”.

I am on record to have made it clear straight away (December 7, 2009) that the primary care consultation document was flawed on a political level as private GPs would inevitably raise their fees substantially because they had no other way to discourage demand.

But it is of great solace to me that the Ombudsman report regarding community health shortcomings tabled this week in Parliament reiterates the two main concerns I had emphasised as a service provider – that a primary healthcare reform could not take place until an e-medicine network is up and running and until there are enough human resources to pool into group practices (8.10.2).

In real terms the Malta Information Technology Agency (MITA) has still not decided on a tender for an integrated health information systems phase 2 that closed in December 2010.

Hence GPs are on a daily basis wasting hours laboriously filling prescriptions for Schedule V holders (patients receiving free medication for chronic illness irrespective of means) who, as I had also predicted, through the Pharmacy Of Your Choice (POYC) mushroomed from 80,000 then to 125,000 by the end of last year. (My PQ 29775).

And this before POYC started being introduced in the less affluent centre-southern half of Malta last January.

Moreover, since the time of writing 30 months ago, I have not noted any upstart GPs setting up a practice, further compromising established family doctors’ time to communicate, examine and investigate patients.

Arguments made public, proved by the test of time, surely cannot be defined as an “internal squabble”. If the Labour Party is to do without such basic consultation, readers may conclude that here again, “better the devil you know”!