Tobago health sector unmanned

KINNESHA GEORGE-HARRY

Healthcare in Tobago is at a standstill amid the global threat of the coronavirus.

So said members of the Tobago House of Assembly (THA) Minority Council, as they addressed members of the media on Tuesday during a media briefing at their Scarborough office.

This comes on the heels of the resignation of Health Secretary Dr Agatha Carrington on Monday and the firing of the CEO of the Tobago Regional Health Authority (TRHA), Sheldon Cyrus, the same day.

Members of the Progressive Democratic Patriots – the Minority Council – have been vocal in their criticism of Carrington's stewardship and repeatedly called on Chief Secretary Kelvin Charles to fire her.

PDP deputy political leader Dr Faith BYisrael said on Tuesday Carrington's departure is a bitter-sweet moment for Tobago as citizens take into consideration the bigger picture.

“Many of us, because of the horrible job that has happened over the last three and a half years and a couple months, were somewhat elated by that news, following social media, listening to people on the ground, the messages is that people seemed to be happy about that,” she said.

BYisrael recalled an online petition last year calling for Carrington to step down, which received more than 3,000 sig­na­tures.

But she said, “I think most of Tobago has since simmered (down)."

She said there is no quick fix to health and "the joy that some people felt at the time quickly waned after we got an additional piece of news that the CEO of the TRHA was let go.”

BYisrael said the double exit leaves a situation “where there seems to be little or no leadership in healthcare while the rest of the world, including TT, is trying to grapple with this new thing that has hit us known as corona(virus).

“This is something that is extremely distressing and at a certain point, I personally started feeling very frustrated and very concerned, because it means that we are going through something that requires us to be completely focused on this thing. We are going through a situation that requires us to have all of our resources focused. It requires us to have all of our i's dotted and our t's crossed."

BYisrael said Tobago continues to suffer aftershocks because of PNM's internal election which saw Charles lose his leadership position to Tracy Davidson-Celestine. The latter is expected to join the THA this week as Carrington has vacated one of the councillor positions.

"Coincidentally, at that very moment, because of a situation that should have been an internal decision of the People’s National Movement, it seems like all of Tobago is now at a standstill and particularly, the healthcare service is at a standstill or is without effective leadership.”

She said Tobagonians need to be very concerned about the situation.

BYisrael encouraged the public to “do all that you can do on a personal level to try to prevent getting this coronavirus.”

She said people need to be concerned but not panic.

Minority Assemblyman Farley Augustine referred to places like Australia, saying that they were immediately able to have scientists and doctors and experts working on it and looking at treatment plans.

“That is where we ought to be, but we cannot be at that place. We had a dysfunctional Secretary of Health, we still have a dysfunctional TRHA board, and I am going to call for the entire TRHA board to either be fired or for them to resign.

“We cannot have a situation where we are changing CEOs more frequently than some people are changing their underwear. That is far too frequent. If it is this board has been picking the wrong CEO so often that every Monday morning they must fire the CEO that they would have hired, it means that something is wrong with the board and we are facing a collapse across the system.

"The entire TRHA board must pack their grips, pack their bags and accompany the secretary out the doors,” he said.

Augustine said he finds it very shocking that the Secretary of Health had resigned and up until Tuesday, no replacement was announced.

“Where is the executive council’s administrative reach in all of this? With whom is the buck stopping?

"Then we know we have a Chief Secretary on pre-retirement leave, more or less, and then we don’t know who would become the mock Chief Secretary that Trinidad would instal on PNM’s behalf – and so the whole system is collapsing because we have allowed the internal ramblings of a party to destroy the spirit of the Representation of the People Act, to destroy, quite frankly, the sanctity of the THA and we have had outsiders, people not elected by Tobagonians more or less sitting down, trying to drive the process, control and manage what happens at the executive council.”