Specialty Hospital is a much-needed institution

TIMES INT'L

Dear Editor,
There is no surgeon’s fee for a kidney transplant at a private hospital, but is it really a case of all that glitters is not gold? At this particular hospital, the cost comes up to some US$20,000 (Gy$4 million). Isn’t this tantamount to saying that only the rich can be accommodated where specialty care is concerned? This leads me directly to the Specialty Hospital that was in the making.
Death, diseases, and sicknesses have no respect for anyone, and with the Specialty Hospital, Guyana would have really come a far way in meeting the needs of so many people. In Trinidad and Tobago, renal complications affect one out of every four people. I do not know what the count is in Guyana, but I have been reading of too many cases of patients seeking specialty care outside of Guyana.  The cost is phenomenal. Is this a case for that Specialty Hospital in Guyana?
Now that the joint opposition has slashed allocations from the budget for 2013, in the specific area of off-setting expenditure for the proposed Specialty Hospital, it means that hope has become quite evanescent for so many in Guyana. This unjustified cut speaks of an opposition that is most cruel and that forms the embodiment of everything that is the opposite of development. Maybe it is because the opposition leaders are quite opulent and really care little about the nation, as such, except that it can be used to propel them to positions of pre-eminence in the country.
Specialty care covers a host of things, including dermatology; ear, nose and throat (ENT); neurology; neurosurgery; orthopaedic foot and ankle; orthopaedic hand; orthopaedic reconstruction; orthopaedic spine surgery; orthopaedic trauma; otology; plastic hand; plastic reconstruction; and urology.
The opposition should never again seek to belittle the Guyanese people. If ever there is to be a setback in the country’s health sector, it would be clear that it would have been designed by the opposition. I call on all stakeholders to come up with some kind of contingency plan to allow for this Specialty Hospital to become a reality.
Yours truly,
Simon Neblette

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