A public health system in crisis
21 Apr, 2021 03:32 AM
14 minutes to read
Chris Leitch says the need for charity hospitals is an "absolute disgrace." Photo / NZ Herald
Northland Age
HEADLINE: A public health system in crisis
Responsibility for the greatest health crisis the country has faced since tuberculosis was a major killer of Pākeha New Zealanders, accounting for 10 per cent of all deaths in the late 19th Century, can be laid firmly at the revolving door of continual changes to the administration of the health system.
Back then Māori were even more vulnerable, with their tuberculosis death rates around ten times those of non-Māori by the 1930s. Re-arranging the deckchairs on the Titanic, as proposed by the Simpson report, will not change those relative inequities of outcome that remain today, or provide more resources to alleviate the critical state of the country's emergency departments.