Authorities stress woman was in “end of life” situation
The death of an elderly woman on a stretcher in a packed A&E in northern Portugal has focused media attention – and that of the national psyche – on the abnormally inept state of the country’s public health system.
Winters are ‘always bad’ in hospital emergency departments, but this one is far worse than normal: mortality hit yet another ‘record high’ on January 2, with 509 deaths registered in a 24-hour period (this is more than the habitual ‘death count’ during Covid days, before the roll out of vaccinations. The explanation this time being “a cold snap, a rise in respiratory infections and a flu ‘epidemic’). Also, the time people seeking medical treatment can wait in A& E to be attended has reached dizzying averages, with one hospital promising an average wait of 11 hours and 59 minutes.
Earlier this week news channels brought the tragic story of an elderly man with dementia left for hours in a wheelchair, confused, and waiting for treatment – now it is the ‘disgrace’ of an 80-year-old woman admitted to A&E only to die before she was seen by a doctor.
Health minister Manuel Pizarro has stressed it would be ‘wrong to make generic analyses’ on the basis of stories like these, as ‘all cases have their own set of circumstances’. In this latest, the woman was at the end of her life, ‘without criteria for any kind of invasive reanimation’, say reports.
But this has not stopped leader writers from saying the equivalent of ‘enough is enough’.
Carlos Rodrigues, editorial director general of Correio da Manhã, queries: “What has happened in our collective life that healthcare has degraded in such a way that A&E timetables have to be publicised as if they were pharmacy opening hours?
“What is happening is not normal, nor worthy of a modern society that respects its citizens”.
Elsewhere, SIC reports today that firefighters are now charging hospitals for the time they ‘retain stretchers’ at A&E departments, without taking charge of the people on them. ND
