Thwaites

THE WRATH of Central Kingston Member of Parliament Ronald Thwaites rained down on Government MP St Aubyn Bartlett during a committee meeting in Gordon House yesterday.

Following a heated exchange between both men, Thwaites later apologised and withdrew the offensive comments directed at his colleague.

Battle lines were drawn when Bartlett accused his opposition colleagues of playing politics during a discussion on whether Government pharmacies were dispensing sufficient drugs to patients.

Chairman of the Public Accounts Appropriations Committee, Dr Wykeham McNeill, committee members Dr Morais Guy, Phillip Paulwell and Thwaites, all opposition MPs, raised similar concerns in relation to prescription drugs.

Increase in requests

The People's National Party (PNP) MPs contended that since the removal of user fees in public hospitals, they had seen a significant increase in the number of requests from constituents for financial assistance to source drugs at private pharmacies.

This, they claim, was because the drugs were not available at the government pharmacies.

Bartlett moved quickly to dismiss his colleagues' assertions. The Jamaica Labour Party MP said he had had a different experience in his Eastern St Andrew constituency. According to him, there had been a reduction in the number of constituents who approached him for help to purchase medication since the free health-care policy started on April 1.

The government MP charged that persons from inner-city communities often asked several persons for cash to fill prescriptions at private pharmacies. He said after obtaining the money, they then went back to the public pharmacies to source the drug.

Bartlett's remarks drew the ire of Thwaites, who said he was talking "damn foolishness". "Don't tell me I am talking damn foolishness because you are dishonest to be coming here and talking about you are seeing more people asking for prescription," Bartlett retorted.

Trying to discredit

He chided Thwaites for "trying to discredit" the Govern-ment's new health-care programme.

"Absolute nonsense!" Thwaites hit back, saying Bartlett was talking "arrant rot".

McNeill intervened to cool tempers, but the verbal sparring worsened when Bartlett accused Thwaites of calling him an idiot. "You are a damn idiot more than me!" Bartlett responded.

However, the Central Kingston MP later expressed remorse at his earlier outbursts. "I was over- wrought because of the gravity of the problem and I used a word in connection with the member Bartlett and I ought not to have, and I apologise and withdraw."

Update

A delegation from the Ministry of Health, led by Permanent Secretary Dr Grace Allen-Young, appeared before the committee to provide an update on the Government's health-care programme.

Allen-Young said the Health Corporation of Jamaica has advised the ministry that it has been satisfying almost 90 per cent of the demand for pharmaceuticals.

Dr Allen Young said there were delays in delivering the Government's free health care, but advised the committee that the ministry was pursuing certain initiatives to address the problem.