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Solomons main hospital a national disgrace

Updated January 11, 2010 17:01:01

The condition of Solomon Islands' National Referral Hospital in Honiara and medical services its provides are labelled as sub-standard and worse than a national disgrace. This was how Peter Boyers, the chairman of a Parliamentary Select Committee inquiry into the situation at the Hospital summed up the committee's finding. The Parliamentary Select Committee report was presented to Parliament just before Christmas after eight months of hearings and investigations. Mr Boyers said when presenting the report to parliament that the government must urgently act to address the parlous state of the country's main hospital as pointed out in the report. Sam Seke asked Mr Boyers why it was necessary to carry out the inquiry into the services and condition of the National Referral Hospital.

Presenter: Sam Seke

Speaker:Peter Boyers, the MP for West New Georgia

BOYERS: Well as everyone knows the level of service at the hospital is substandard, so it was an opportunity for a select committee to look into the quality of the health services, find out where the systemic weaknesses are, what is perpetuating this problem, so that the government can then address them to improve the quality of health service at the hospital.

SEKE: In a nutshell, what was the finding of the parliamentary select committee inquiry into the National Referral Hospital?

BOYERS: Well basically, we do not have enough nurses, doctors and there is not adequate opportunities and of course budgetary issues. It is also capacity-building obviously within administration, an effective ordering and delivery of materials, the necessary equipment. They do not have necessary equipment. So it's a lack of adequate training for the staff. We're understaffed and the government has not really reacted on it and of course the donors are involved, like AusAid are doing quite a good job in addressing those issues. There are certain issues getting addressed, but there needs an urgent action taken on how to have the necessary staff in place. It is a budgetary issue mixed in with public service and I think the public service needs to take a very quick look at themselves and work out what they are doing in the country besides filling in posts and not taking action about making sure we have qualified personnel there.

SEKE: Now you were quoted as saying the situation at the National Referral Hospital was a national disgrace. Was that a fair comment. If so, why?

BOYERS: Well, I don't know what you term as a national disgrace, but I think the quality of service there is understated as a national disgrace. If you have ever been in it, you don't want to ever go back there again. As one of the public servants said when he said, I was in there and I had to get out as fast as I could. So when you have doors that are rotted off the toilets, and sort of bad smell and there is no beds and there is no mattresses and then there is people full up in the wards and the presence of doctors is not there and the nurses are over stretched. I mean it is basically that's why they call it Number 10 and Number 9 hospital, because Number 10 is classified as the cemetery, so it is what they call the last stop before you get buried.

SEKE: Now, health has always been a priority area for governments in Solomon Islands over the years. It gets, well I believe it gets a sizeable chunk of government budgetary allocation for and as you alluded to, it gets assistance from international donor agencies. But are you saying that's not sufficient?

BOYERS: Eh, look the Select Committee was investigating the National Referral Hospital. It was not investigating the national health system and one of the problems is while we've got problems with our National Referral Hospital, is because the peripheral of our health centres and clinics and rural hospitals are obviously are not capacitized and the people are not getting the necessary level of medical address they need and that is why the National Referral Hospital is becoming over stretched so to speak. So it is a complacency in the public service, it's complacency in the health system overall. The present administration of the PS and the undersecretary actually are on track. They have a strategic development plan. It is well articulated, addresses the issues, it is just a matter of how serious are we or the government in making it work. As far as health as a priority of the country, health should be priority number one, education number two, infrastructure number three and that's how it should be for a long, long time.

It's no good putting a reservation on health, because we have a revenue problem, a 20 per cent reservation on health expenditure when the government goes out and rents a building for foreign affairs for $150,000 a month.

SEKE: So where to next with your parliamentary select committee report on the National Referral Hospital? What's going to happen to it next?

BOYERS: Okay, well it's been tabled, we're going to be debating that in the March sitting and of course all the issues will come out. It's really the next step after that is that when of course parliament resolves in April, elections in July. The new government comes in. What would be ideal for another select committee to come in to and revisit the hospital, see what sort of improvement, as well as take on the rest of the hospitals in the country and probably some health centres and clinics, to also look at what is the weakness there. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to work it out and I think we already know, But unless you have a proper report done on it no-one is going to take any notice.

SEKE: I think it would be fair to say that most committee reports are put on the shelves and forgotten after they have been presented to parliament. Do you feel have any fear that may be your report might suffer the same fate?

BOYERS: Well, as long as I am alive and I am an member of parliament, it is not going to happen, because obviously I can scream until it happens. But that is the general trend. It is the general trend that reports get put aside. I mean even in the foreign relations committee on the RAMSI review, there are certain issues there that have been starring us in the face and yet have not been addressed in this year's budget, even though the committee's report had come out in time for the police vehicles etc. logistics. It has not really been addressed in the budget and this is the problem. Is it a budgetary problem, is it bureaucratic issue, is it a lack of will and wear, is it like in the health select committee? We have worked with the administration and health? They are also very well aware, But at the end of the day, they are to subject to the Public Service Commission or Public Service Division or ministry as well as finance in their budgetary process.