In his letter ‘Futile PN hopes’ (February 9), Eddy Privitera announces triumphantly that a “new company” will take over the flawed contract from Vitals Global Healthcare.
He presents this botched attempt at damage limitation as a great leap forward for our health service. Never mind that government negotiator(s) had originally entered into suspicious talks to hand over control of three of our hospitals to a labyrinthine multi-tentacled Frankenstein composed of obscure shareholders hiding behind a hurriedly set up spoof ‘company’ called Vitals Global Healthcare.
We heard of this plan to sell the ‘Vitals’ shambles to a colossal American business enterprise nearly two months ago. On December 21, Steward Plc was tweeted mellifluously by our Prime Minister as having “chosen Malta for its first international investment” and touted as “the largest private healthcare operator in US”.
The public is still in the dark on whether the new contract has been signed (again, behind our backs). If it has, then three important hospitals, originally built at taxpayers’ expense, will be under the control of a commercial company for 33 -99 years. Our destiny is sealed.
A description of privatised medicine in Der Spiegel (December 17, 2016) sums it up: “These privatised) hospitals are now managed as a sausage factory. Profit margins override the needs of patients. Sick people in need of hospital treatment are regarded as revenue sources. Nursing staff become cost factors. Doctors’ performance assessed in terms of profit rather than efficacy as physicians. Hospital staff is reduced to a minimum, putting them under pressure. Patients are denied what they needed most: ‘A hand to hold as their end approached.’ Medicine had become inhuman when dignity matters so much.”
Compassionate care of the sick is not a marketable item. Its immense value cannot be captured in monetary terms. If this fatal deal goes through, our three hospitals will be used as money-spinners for generating income for Steward shareholders at taxpayers’ expense.
Malta must at all costs draw the nation’s health out of this hideous entanglement with big business.