Shocking revelation of Sabah’s healthcare conditions
By Queville To, Free Malaysia Today
KOTA KINABALU: Several issues rippled through Parliament last week but none more painful to hear than a serving medical officer’s shocking revelation of the deplorable conditions in Sabah Queen Elizabeth Hospital (QEH) and the ‘games’ ailing patients are made to play.
Midweek in Parliament saw DAP advisor Lim Kit Sang, brandishing a letter from a bitterly disappointed doctor from QEH, demanding that Prime Minister Najib Tun Razak sack his health minister immediately and appoint a new one.
Shocked and outraged by the doctor’s claims, Lim said: “This is an utter shame for the prime minister’s 1Malaysia and his pledge of “People First, Performance Now.
“Either Najib give Liow (Tiong Lai) an ultimatum to immediately resolve the deplorable healthcare crisis in Sabah or Najib should make an example of Liow by sacking him and appoint a new health minister for the country,” Lim had said.
He said that Liow had been health minister for more than two years and despite repeated complaints, had turned a deaf ear and blind eye to the prolonged healthcare crisis and the deplorable hospital conditions in Sabah, particularly in Kota Kinabalu.
Lim said the doctor had sent an open letter to Liow describing in detail the deplorable conditions of the hospital complexes in Sabah, particularly the QEH which the doctor likened to Vietnam refugee camp.
He said the doctor wrote of the horrors suffered by the sick in Kota Kinabalu where they are subjected to “a wicked game of musical chairs” and shunted around various hospital centres according to their changing healthcare needs as “there is not a single centre that can address a patient as a whole”.
