The NSW Opposition this week uncovered health documents that the Minns Labor Government has kept hidden for years – so let’s break it down:
The files revealed a mould outbreak in a transplant ward at RPA which claimed the lives of multiple patients.
Minister Ryan Park denied hiding the deaths from last November, claiming it couldn’t be a cover up because “we told the cleaners.”
The same documents exposed mould in Tamworth Hospital that was first reported back in 2023 and has yet to be removed to this day.
Just next door in the specialised Rehab Unit, patients and staff contracted bird lice, after a pigeon waste problem inside the Unit was left unmanaged for well over a year.
It has been extensively reported that mould recently forced the closure of cancer wards and the ICU at Calvary Mater Newcastle, but these explosive documents show the shocking extent of the maintenance and hygiene issues at this hospital, and the nearby John Hunter Children’s Hospital, including that warnings were first sent to Ryan Park back in 2023.
On top of this, on Tuesday, a fourth patient escaped from the Cumberland Mental Health Facility. Earlier this month, three people died in two separate incidents allegedly involving other patients who escaped the same facility.
The Minns Labor Government publicly acknowledged the chronic understaffing at Cumberland two whole years ago, and despite this, the budget for hospital security in the Western Sydney LHD has been halved by Ryan Park since 2022.
One day after the fourth escape, and after a week of hiding and intense media pressure, the Minister for Mental Health Rose Jackson ordered a review. The findings from her 2024 review into the same hospital are yet to be made public.
Despite these horrors, and a raft of others including insects in operating theatres and mice in hospital staff kitchens, Chris Minns, and Ryan Park this week chose to re-open the ‘new’ Sydney Children’s Hospital, a hospital they already opened last year – proving politics and a photo op comes before patients for this government.
Unfortunately, our public health system is literally falling apart on Ryan Park’s watch.
Patients go to hospital for treatment and care, not to be put in further danger due to toxic mould, or conditions caused by bird droppings and dead pigeons in roof cavities and air-conditioning units.
Hygiene in hospitals is paramount and my heart breaks for the families who have lost loved ones to these illnesses.
My genuine fear is this is the tip of the iceberg and there is more to be uncovered. I sincerely hope not.
Ryan Park has had three years to ‘make a good health system even better’ as promised.
I think it’s time to give someone else a go.
