The Tribune

By NICO SCAVELLA

Tribune Staff Reporter

nscavella@tribunemedia.net

A LEADING surgeon yesterday criticised the Christie administration after an official suggested that a delay in the primary care phase of National Health Insurance is a possibility, saying it “speaks to a level of administrative incompetence that we have not seen in the history of a sovereign Bahamas”.

Dr Duane Sands, the former Free National Movement senator and cardiothoracic surgeon, said he was “not surprised” by recent statements from NHI Project Manager Dr Delon Brennen, which he said again shows that the government “is incapable of doing anything in a timely fashion.”

On Friday, while a guest on Guardian Radio 96.9 FM’s radio talk show “The Revolution” with host Juan McCartney, Dr Brennen suggested a delay in the implementation date of the primary care phase is possible. Dr Brennen also said the NHI Secretariat is unclear when phase two, which covers enrolment for NHI, will begin.

“We don’t know whether it will be delayed or not,” Dr Brennen said on Friday.

He added: “I think we have to come to an understanding that we are pushing our hardest to move it to as early in this process as possible. But I think we do have to be realistic as these things progress that there may be times when things get moved. We as an NHI movement are trying to be as honest and open with the Bahamian people as we can. And from our side, we want to let you know that we are working as hard as we can to do it, but we all have to play our part.

“And we could push with providers, but if (healthcare) providers don’t sign up, we’re in trouble,” Dr Brennen said.

The primary care phase is set to begin in April, officials have previously said.

When contacted for comment yesterday, Dr Sands said: “They just simply cannot do it. It speaks to a level of administrative incompetence that we have not seen in the history of a sovereign Bahamas.”

“I’ve been saying this all along,” he added. “I suggested that I didn’t think it was possible for them to accomplish what they said they were going to accomplish in the timeline set aside…and so now that the technical people are saying, ‘boy you know I don’t think we’re going to be able to do this’, it is a dose of reality that is starting to set in. So I’m not surprised.”

Earlier this month, NIB Senior Deputy Director Cecile Bethel told reporters that the registration component of NHI cannot start until NHI legislation is passed to allow the National Insurance Board to share information about its registrants with the NHI Secretariat.

In January, NIB ramped up the registration process for its smart card, which will be used to identify those who are eligible for NHI.

On this issue, Dr Sands said: “We have also made it clear that there is no legal framework for the enrolment of people using NIB.

“And so this government has perpetrated a fraud on the Bahamian public by suggesting that people are signing up for NHI. They’re not signing up for anything, they’re signing up for NIB.

“And so what they want people to believe is that NHI has started. It has not started, because ‘NHI’ does not exist.”

Dr Sands added that the draft legislation for NHI is “certainly not ready for primetime,” adding that it has not yet been widely circulated with doctors or other stakeholders.

“Here we are seven weeks before the proposed rollout of NHI,” he said. “Can you imagine rushing such a vital piece of legislation to be considered, to be digested, to be discussed amongst not only stakeholders but an entire population, and you only have less than seven weeks?”

He added: “The problem with this administration is that the introduction of the (primary) phase of NHI has nothing to do with whether or not it is ready, whether it’s been carefully thought out, whether it’s been carefully planned. It is a political mandate.

“And they will put something together and say ‘okay, let’s throw this at the people’, whether it works or doesn’t work, whether it’s right or it isn’t right, whether we have the legislation in place or not, because this is about politics. The issue of the quality of healthcare is a secondary concern.”