Dawn Chorus: Ethnicity a factor in surgery decisions
NewstalkZB reports surgeons must consider ethnicity when prioritising lists; Philanthropists campaign to get $10b of Covid cash given back; Queues at after-hours medical centre in Lower Hutt
TL;DR: The intense stress on the health system is building to a crescendo as winter illnesses mount and decades of under-funding force surgeons to pick and choose who to operate on first.
Barry Soper and Jason Walls reported for NewstalkZB this morning that Auckland surgeons must now consider a patient’s ethnicity alongside other factors when deciding who should get an operation first. They reported Te Whatu Ora - Health New Zealand had introduced an Equity Adjustor Score, which aimed to reduce inequity in the system by using an algorithm to prioritise patients according to clinical priority, time spent on the waitlist, geographic location, ethnicity, and deprivation level.
This will get a lot of attention this morning and I suspect be blown up into an election issue. The real issue is the real per-capita underfunding of health infrastructure and services over at least two decades, and the ongoing sinking lid policies that are forceing doctors to make the ugliest choices. All so the Government can keep its net debt under a self-imposed level relative to GDP and keep wealth untaxed.
Meanwhile, The Post-$$$’s Conor Knell reported this morning Lower Hutt’s only After Hours Medical centre had queues out the door on Friday night as winter illnesses begin to rise, just 30 minutes after opening at 5pm.
Elsewhere, Christchurch philanthropists Grant and Marilyn Nelson are launching an advertising campaign targeting the Ministry of Social Development over $10 billion of covid wage subsidy overpayments, Stuff’s Rob Stock reported this morning. They want to see the MSD and the Government step up their investigations and intensity into recovering wrongly-granted billions and ensuring it is paid back.
Just briefly elsewhere
Heads up - Canada announced on Friday night it would investigate claims the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) was effectively controlled by China’s Communist Party after extraordinary claims by a Canadian who worked at a senior level in the AIIB and fled Beijing before making the claims. New Zealand is also a member of the AIIB with CNN
Quote of the day
‘Enough with the greenwashing’
UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres gave an escoriating speech on Friday seen as criticising the hosts of the COP28 climate summit being held in major oil producer United Arab Emirates in December. It’s worth reading/watching in full.
“Fossil fuel industry transition plans must be transformation plans that chart a company’s move to clean energy and away from a product incompatible with human survival. Otherwise, they are just proposals to become more efficient planet-wreckers.” UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres speaking on Friday night about climate change. Transcript
Chart of the day
Houston, we have a problem
Map of the day
British temperatures may hit 40 degrees C due to a marine heatwave
Useful longer reads
One fun thing
Ka kite ano
Bernard
I am a retired anaesthetist who worked in the NZ public health system for 25 years. Racism in health care is real, due to implicit bias. The degree of ignorance of this fact among well meaning doctors and nurses is depressing.
There is plenty of published evidence to validate the fact that there is gross inequity in our health care system. The most striking statistic is that a Maori child should know from day one that he or she has a lifespan which is on average 10 years less than that of a Pakeha child born on the same day.
Anybody who tries to spin this is guilty of wilful ignorance or deliberately spreading misinformation.
I'll take a wild bet (no, not wild at all) that this new requirement to also consider ethnicity will be blown out of proportion as is the usual modus operandi of National & ACT whenever white NZ needs to acknowledge the systemic racism and deprivation of Māori and Pacifica population. This will yet again divert the conversation away from having to discuss decades of underfunding, our built in reluctance to pay more tax and out tendency to magical thinking we can have Scandinavian level of public services while having yet another tax cut because of the beloved corporations buzz words.