Headed’ Says Surgeon

Fiji Medical Dept ‘Pig

Mr Deo Datt Sharma, con sultant surgeon in Fiji, has re signed from the public service because he is not satisfied with the way things are run. In his letter of resignation Mr Sharma said that since joining the staff of the CWM Hospital in 1974 he had noted things which rose out of bigotry and gross administrative inad equacy. He said administrators had been so pig-headed in the past that it was impossible to impress any change on them.

“Now, with amateurs in schoolboys’ uniforms in

charge, things have reached

ridiculous proportions,” he said.

Mr Sharma said the posting of doctors to the surgical unit was a big joke. Almost any Tom, Dick or Harry was con sidered fit to do surgery. There were many examples of lack of drugs and instruments. Nurs ing care was worse now.

Mr Sharma intends to go

into private practice in Suva.

He spent a year at the Fiji School of Medicine before going to Bombay on an Indian government scholarship. There he obtained a medical degree, after which he spent four years in New Zealand, then two in the UK at his own expense. He became a fellow of the Royal

College of Surgeons of

England and a Fellow of the

Royal College of Surgeons of

Edinburgh. In 1974 he returned to Fiji to work at the CWM Hospital in Suva.

Mr Sharma’s resignation and

other complaints about general

laxity in health care led to de mands for an inquiry into Fiji’s medical services. The Minister for Health, Mr Ted Beddoes, said there would be no inquiry, but he would study carefully all points raised and act on them if necessary. A few days later the government changed its mind and agreed to an

independent inquiry into Fiji’s

health services.