12. HEATHER ROY (Deputy Leader—ACT) Link to this
to the Minister of Health
On what date did he first learn of any of the deaths of the three Hawke’s Bay District Health Board patients who died in Hawke’s Bay Hospital while on Wellington Hospital’s waiting list for heart surgery, as reported on the front page of the Hawke’s Bay Today newspaper on 8 December 2007, and what action, if any, did he take?
Hon JIM ANDERTON (Associate Minister of Health) Link to this
I am advised that the chair of the Hawke’s Bay District Health Board indicated in a telephone conversation with the Minister on 13 November that the chair held information relating to deaths in Hawke’s Bay. The Minister indicated this to his officials on the same day. The officials began immediately following up with the Hawke’s Bay District Health Board. On Monday, 19 November both the Hawke’s Bay District Health Board and the Capital and Coast District Health Board provided written reports to the Ministry of Health that indicated that actions were already in place to increase access to cardiothoracic surgery at the Capital and Coast District Health Board.
Why has the Minister’s response to these tragic deaths been to attack me for not passing on details, when there is a mandatory reporting requirement for any death of a person on a waiting list?
As far as I am aware, the member was claiming publicly to have information that would have been of assistance to officials in any investigation into these matters. As I said to her the last time she asked this question, she actually then instigated an Official Information Act request to the hospital board that she claimed she had information on in the first place. That seemed to be entirely inconsistent, and not very responsible for a member of this Parliament.
Is the state of the health system so poor that it takes an Opposition MP and a Hawke’s Bay Today journalist, Kate Newton, to bring such serious failures at Capital and Coast District Health Board to light, because the Minister’s approach is to cover up, and to attack those who are exposing the truth?
I think it is irresponsible of any member of this House to define a hospital, to describe a hospital in the New Zealand health system, as a “killer hospital”; that is what I think is irresponsible. The Minister acted immediately. There was no delay in that. The reports were made back to the Ministry of Health. That is on the public record. The plans that were made by the Capital and Coast District Health Board have been implemented, and more operations are actually being delivered. I must say, as a New Zealander, that I am proud of the hospital system in this country. My experience and the experience of thousands of my constituents who have gone through it have been universally good. We can expect incidents in our hospitals from time to time—of course we can—but, by and large, we have an excellent hospital system and we should be proud of it.