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The recent Hepatitis C outbreak at Singapore General Hospital could have, and should have, been released earlier.
Why wasn’t it released earlier then?
SDP Chief Dr Chee Soon Juan has made his opinions clear – He has asked the Government why it took them five whole months before they announced anything.
Dr Chee also questioned if it had anything to do with “political considerations” seeing that it could have affected the public’s sentiment in the General Elections that was held last month. Last Tuesday, SGH revealed that 22 patients in its renal ward had been diagnosed with Hepatitis C. Eight patients had died, with four deaths possibly linked to the virus. In response to the outbreak, PM Lee had said that the government must be “open and transparent” about the matter.
Minister Gan has some questions to answer:
How will they be accounted for? Chiefly those that have been infected by the virus and the loved ones of those that have suffered:
Will there be a scheme to compensate for the lapse? As the damage suffered from Hepatitis is for life and will most likely have long term repercussions.
What are the next steps towards Containment? Hepatitis C is a highly infectious virus and the outbreak could have been contained sooner.
What are the next steps towards Communications? The public, if made aware about the infection could have been better prepared for it. Instead the outbreak has not been contained and people have died and suffered from the virus.
[plinker]
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