My family and I, who are essentially lay persons in medical matters, regret to note the pitiful style in which Professor Cilia Vincenti once more attempts to counter our efforts to seek justice in our son's case (The Sunday Times, May 15).
We do not in any way resent Professor Cilia Vincenti's comments. We only react to his public comments, as is our right in a democratic country. The fact that we referred to another reader's letter, in no way constitutes double standards.
We want to make the public aware of a grey zone that is not entirely in tune with the system of autonomous judicial process prevalent in Malta's legal codex.
The phrase "trial by media", with respect to this issue, has not been primarily applied by us. The phrase has been used by Professor Cilia Vincenti and by other parties, who evidently appear to take a clearly defensive position in this case.
Professor Cilia Vincenti of course has a right to comment about his personal forensic experience in the UK. However, he has no inherent right to contradict, and denigrate, at his convenience, other expert information, which, for example, can be found in Internet sources.
Moreover, as he is of course aware, Malta is now a member of the EU and, as such must, and can, regulate its own process and procedures, and also follow EU guidelines and regulations in this context. We are in no way obliged to follow the practice of British citizens.
Professor Cilia Vincenti opines that "the Ministry [of Health] has only fallen in line with the rest of the commercial world, where the employer is deemed responsible for his/her employees' mistakes". He adds that we "wrongly interpret this as the ministry acknowledging fault specific to (our) son's death".
However, it is clear from our contribution (May 8) that our comment was not categoric, but cautious, althugh the ministry's move to accept responsibility for payment of damages arising from its employee's "mistake" was and is completely unprecedented. If the Ministry of Health did not, or does not, "acknowledge fault specific to my son's death", so has the Ministry of Health a legitimate right to appeal.
As a former UK Coroner's pathologist, Professor Cilia Vincenti should apply the term "criminal" with more care and insight.
My family and I are contending a scenario of medical negligence, for which there exists real, tangible and legally valid evidence, even within the potential context of a special case of Group A Streptococcus infection. The medical negligence is in this case intertwined with a scenario resulting in an unfortunate fatal outcome.
If, as we wish to assume, the act of medical negligence is legally and judicially confirmed, then one must consider and examine that act within the framework of Malta's existing code of laws, which foresees medical negligence as a criminal act punishable by law. Otherwise, if this status quo in unacceptable to the Minister of Health or doctors' representatives, it should be their priority to strive towards amendment of this legal status with respect to medical negligence.
We do not know whether Professor Cilia Vincenti himself is also a parent, who wishes to offer us psychological consolation for having lost a child under tragic circumstances, based on his own personal experience as a parent.
We finally do trust that our efforts to seek justice in this unfortunate medico-legal scenario will not be unduly countered and hindered more it than has already been.