Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/822666
maltatoday, THURSDAY, 11 MAY 2017 4 News Muscat: We are building a future- proof health system YANNICK PACE THE government had brought about a "huge change" in the country's healthcare system over the past four years and this was easily noticeable by people, Prime Minister Joseph Muscat said this morning. Speaking at a press conference outlining the party's propos- als for the upcoming election, Muscat said the government had inherited a system that "was not ready for the present" which included a hospital which was smaller than required in every department, bad management systems that resulted in beds placed in corridors, a long list of out-of-stock medicines and long waiting lists. Moreover, he said that while Mater Dei Hospital was a good hospital, albeit a small one, a number of other healthcare fa- cilities, such as the Gozo Gen- eral Hospital, had been allowed to deteriorate. Muscat said that his admin- istration, had brought work on the Sir Anthony Mamo Oncol- ogy Centre back on track, had started work a number of hos- pitals and clinics around the island. In addition to this, he said that waiting lists had been reduced to manageable levels, there were no beds left in corri- dors and out-of-stock medicines were now a thing of the past. "Not because we spent more money, in fact we saved mon- ey, but because we introduced management systems that one would expect to find in a multi- million Euro sector like health," Muscat said. Health minister Chris Fearne, who was also present at the press conference, announced that the Medicines' Author- ity had signed an agreement with eight other countries that will see the countries negotiate medicine prices with multina- tional pharmaceutical compa- nies as a single consortium. "This will allow us to get bet- ter value for money when we are buying medicines," Muscat said. "It is emblematic of the way this government solves problems. Not by throwing money at them but by discussion with stake- holders." Fearne said that the achieve- ments attained in the past four years would now act a "spring- board" that would allow the country's healthcare system to reach the next level. He stressed that healthcare would remain free, arguing that the Labour Party was "the only guarantee" for this remaining so. Fearne insisted, however, that healthcare remaining free does not mean there is no room for the private sector. "There can be sectors where we choose to work together and others where patients can have a choice to use the private sec- tor instead," he said, pointing to Labour's proposal to give tax re- bate to those taking out private health insurance. Like Muscat, Fearne noted that Mater Dei Hospital was too small and pledged that a new Labour government would build a new outpatients section just outside Mater Dei. He said that this would reduce the pres- sure on the current outpatient's department which, owing to its small size, could not cope and was forced to give people ap- pointments that were too far in the future. He said that a new five-storey underground carpark would be built beneath this new depart- ment, the first floor of which would serve as a bus terminus so as to reduce congestion out- side the hospital. In addition, a Labour govern- ment would also build a chil- dren's hospital just outside Ma- ter Dei that would serve to free up beds at main hospital, and a psychiatric hospital in Swatar that would be connect to Mater Dei by a tunnel. The govern- ment would also refurbish the current Mount Carmel Hospi- tal. According to Fearne, this would result in a significant in- crease in jobs in the healthcare sector. The minister said that the list of free medicines would be increased and the government intended to offer all cancer medication, as well as prostate medication and that required for osteoporosis and heart prob- lems, for free. Fearne also an- nounced that an agreement had been signed with a supplier of diabetes sticks and that an order of 65 million had been made. "This will leave more money in people's pockets and will also help us tackle the most preva- lent conditions in Malta," he said. Finally, Fearne said that as part of the government's push to offer some services within the community, work on a €1 million clinic in Kirkop was underway, while the necessary permits were in place for work to start on a health centre in Paola. He said the government also intended to set up a simi- lar type of clinic in the North, probably Mosta. He said that a remote patient monitoring pilot project had been started and that this would be expanded if Labour were to be given a second term. "It means that we will be in- stalling monitoring equipment in people's homes – obviously with their consent – that will in- form us when a patient's condi- tion is deteriorating before they do," he said. The system, according to Fearne, would revolutionise the country's healthcare system, with the pilot project, run us- ing patients suffering with heart disease, having already shown a 41% reduction in the number of admissions. PN youths insist on full marriage equality in party manifesto CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1 The MZPN said that since 2014, Malta's civil unions law has given same-sex couples the same rights and obligations as marriage. "Calling civil union by its real name – marriage – is the logical thing to do," the MZPN spokesperson said. "The PN will support this proposal and party leader Simon Busuttil is known to support gay marriage, having already gone on record a year ago saying that he is in favour of this change," the spokesper- son said. "The change is an impor- tant step toward full marriage equality. Love has no gender. We believe that it is high time that this recognition is grant- ed and that this issue is no longer used for political mile- age by anyone with ulterior motives other than absolute equality." Civil liberties minister He- lena Dalli has hit out at the PN over its selection of the right-winger Josie Muscat – a former Nationalist MP in the 1980s who later contested the elections with his hard right and anti-immigration party Azzjoni Nazzjonali in 2008 – to contest on the PN ticket. Dalli took the party to task for taking back Muscat on its bal- lot sheet, citing it as a threat to civil liberties gained in the past four years. A Marriage Equality Bill was already announced back in February by Dalli, who said that the Civil Union Law gave gay couples the same rights as heterosexual couples under a different name. "Our civil union law is already on a par with marriage. All the rights are there and it's just differ- ent in name so we're chang- ing that. We're working on it," Dalli said. Joseph Muscat had already said he was in favour of gay marriage, but his statement came right in the midst of the Panama Papers scandal in March 2016. At the time, Simon Busuttil had said that since the Civil Unions Act gave gays the same rights and obligations as those in a civil marriage, he could not see any difficulty in the name being changed to reflect what the union represented – a mar- riage.