Soper on ending racial priorities in surgery

Barry Soper writes:

It’s not often in this business that you can sit back with some satisfaction and feel justified a year later that a story you broke resulted in an outcome fair to all.

The formal part ethnicity played in hospital waiting lists caused a political storm.

It was justified by the then Labour Government whose Health Minister Ayesha Verrall said she was happy with the policy that gave Māori and Pasifika patients priority over Pākehā and other ethnicities.

Less popular with patients!

The current Health Minister Shane Reti stated the bleedingly obvious – clinical decisions should be made on health need first.

The message seems to have hit home at the bloated Health NZ which now says a fundamental relook at the system is required.

One of their gloriously anonymous spokespeople there was quoted as saying that they will now look into the possibility of adopting a new prioritisation tool across the whole health system, but emphasised no decisions had been made.

The decision shouldn’t be too difficult to make; give health care to those who need it first, rather than expecting them to jockey for position on a waiting list based on their ancestry.

It shouldn’t be difficult indeed, but for the last Government it was.