Updated - Gozitans cancer patients who need to travel to Malta for chemotherapy will be offered free transport from Gozo, including a car rental service, until the Government fulfils its promise to offer chemotherapy in Gozo, Health Minister Godfrey Farrugia said this evening.
He said that last February, former Prime Minister Lawrence Gonzi had said that the project to set up chemotherapy in Gozo would cost €600,000. However, only €80,000 were allocated for the service in the Budget.
"We did not give up and we will not use this as an excuse not to provide the service... Each of the 11 or 12 patients who need the service are precious to us. We are re evaluating the plan and we have managed to slash the cost to €200,000," the minister said.
Until the service was up and running - by the end of this year - patients who needed to travel to Malta would be given a "personalised service" including organised transport, he said.
Dr Farrugia said that the bulk of the expenses at the Gozo Hospital were salaries. In Gozo there were 708 workers at the hospital, the majority of whom were not health providers, he observed.
In other comments, made during a public consultation meeting, Dr Farrugia said the government wanted to guarantee a public-private mix of services to ensure that the people had a choice.
Last week, Dr Farrugia said, he went to Boffa Hospital and found €455,000 worth of expired medicines. Apart from that, in a store at Mater Dei Hospital he found €35,000 worth of other expired medicines and medical equipment such as catheters. Even worse, he said, he recently came across of some €300,000 worth of expired materials used for knee and hip replacements at Mater Dei Hospital.
This, he said, showed that there was a lot of waste that was leading to cuts in other areas.
He said that during a recent visit to Mt Carmel Hospital, he found that a ward had been renovated, gypsum plaster was completed, but everybody forgot to put in electricity points.
In another case, he had asked for a quote of the costs of migrating the Victoria health centre to Gozo Hospital. He was given a quote of €311,000. H viewed that as being too high and it was eventually brought down to €77,000. When he asked for an explanation of the discrepancy, he was told officials had abided by normal practice.
"You'd be able to get more syringes if there is not so much waste," he told a diabetic woman who earlier said she needed more than the 10 monthly syringes given to her by government.
The woman said she needed two injections a day. Each syringe cost 35 cents but she could not afford all the ones she needed to she reused the syringes up to four times against her doctor's recommendations.