Peeping Tom...THE OBSERVATION WARD

Peeping Tom…THE OBSERVATION WARD

Aug 20, 2008 Features / Columnists, Peeping Tom

I support a call which was made by a letter writer for citizens and the business community to contribute towards the rebuilding efforts after last week’s fire that levelled the Observation Ward and affected other parts of the Georgetown Public Hospital Corporation.
I agree with the view that there is a role for the business community and citizens to play in restoring national assets. Before the donations begin to roll in however, there are certain things which I feel should be put in place.
The first of these is a comprehensive inquiry into the fire. I am not into conspiracy theories but I feel that it is important that the facts surrounding how a fire was started be made known since if anyone was negligent, then that negligence has resulted in the loss of millions of dollars and therefore that person must be held liable for their actions.
I think that the nation’s patience is running thin when it comes to the reluctance of the administration to utilize something that is an essential tool in ensuring accountable governance. That tool is public inquiries. Public inquiries are to disasters what inquests are to unnatural deaths. There can be no justice, no holding anyone to account unless there are inquiries into disasters and inquests into deaths that are unnatural.
The second aspect that I would like examined is the safety precautions that were in place at the hospital. I am sure that for such a large institution as the public hospital that there would have been a number of functioning fire extinguishers placed at strategic points in all wards, and that the staff of the hospital would have been fully drilled on what to do in case a fire or any other emergency arose.
I believe that before citizens and businesses begin to lend any helping hand to the restoration of the parts of the Georgetown Hospital that were destroyed by fire that an inquiry covering the safety precautions and the cause of the fire should be launched.
I believe that the international donor community has been injecting a great amount of funds into the health sector and they should demand, diplomatically of course, that a thorough investigation be launched. Surely, it is time that those with the financial muscle indicate to the government that they will no longer be willing to provide assistance to rebuild public property which has been destroyed, unless there are investigations into the cause of the destruction.
Quite frankly I do not believe that the Observation Ward should be rebuilt. I will support the call for a twenty-four hour Outpatient Unit at the burnt out site but I do not believe that that location is suitable for treating mentally ill patients.
The very fact that we can speak about an Observation Ward demonstrates how far we have fallen behind the rest of the world when it comes to the treatment of mental health. What we need is a different kind of environment in which to confine those whom it is felt need treatment. And anyone who has had any passing familiarity with what passed as an Observation Ward at the Georgetown Public Hospital Corporation would know that such an environment is far from ideal for treating the mentally ill.
What we need is a larger facility with rooms and treatment units, along with spacious and well- manicured outdoors that are conducive to modern treatment methods. I would therefore respectfully submit that what we need is a new treatment hospital, one that provides treatment and institutionalization under the same roof.
I think that we already have a mental hospital in Berbice and I think that all mentally ill patients should be moved to that location which should be developed into a modern mental complex. This column has before also suggested that the old New Amsterdam Hospital which featured in the news not so long ago as being attacked by vandals, can be used as a treatment annex.
My suggestion to government is therefore to come up with a short-term plan to relocate the Observation Ward from the Georgetown Hospital to Berbice. All Georgetown Hospital needs is a temporary holding facility until such time as the patients can make the journey to Berbice.
I am hoping that when this plan is developed that instead of having to seek external funding, as is the norm, the business community and citizens can make a contribution towards the upgrading of the facilities at Canje in Berbice where the mentally ill are institutionalized.
The Georgetown Hospital should forget about trying to rebuild the Observation Ward. Any such plan should join the rubble at the old burnt out site.

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