KEVON FELMINE
kevon.felmine@guardian.co.tt
In his return to Parliament as a temporary Opposition Senator, former Minister of Education Dr Tim Gopeesingh lambasted the Government’s handling of COVID-19, calling for the resignation or termination of Minister of Health Terrence Deyalsingh.
Gopeesingh, who retired from active politics in 2020, replaced an ill Damian Lyder.
He said over the last 18 months, T&T experienced a state of unprecedented destruction and political and socioeconomic war launched by the Government.
During a fiery contribution to the Appropriation (Financial Year-2022) 2021 Bill in the Upper House yesterday, the former Caroni East MP also called for the resignation of several ministry officials.
Senate Vice-President Nigel de Freitas intervened several times to ask Gopeesingh to temper his words, deeming them inflammatory.
“The COVID-19 deaths of over 1600 citizens rest squarely on the hands of the Minister of Health, the Honourable Prime Minister and the seriously, clinically inexperienced medical advisers. They must all go. We call for them to be removed and resign on their own,” Gopeesingh said.
His contribution regurgitated several comments made by himself and the Opposition recently.
Referring to the ministry officials responsible for managing the State’s COVID-19 response, Gopeesingh said he taught three of them. He said they had not worked in hospitals for more than two years and did not understand clinical practice and medicine.
“So they stand guilty of failing to significantly protect and prevent the loss of lives of our loved ones.”
Gopeesingh said the Government spent near $42 billion on health in the last six years and during the pandemic, $5 billion, but T&T ranks 49th globally in deaths per million populations according to John Hopkins University.
He said India, Jamaica, Barbados, and most other Caribbean countries had better positions.
He said statements by Deyalsingh that his role as a minister stops at the doorsteps of the hospital shows gross incompetence and mismanagement.
He said that when the Opposition tried to raise COVID-19 as an urgent matter in Parliament, the Government did not find it important.
Gopeesingh stressed that there were insufficient doctors and nursing staff in hospitals while graduates were working at service stations, begging for jobs.
And as testing in the public health system has a long wait for results, he chastised the Government for refusing to use rapid antigen testing. Gopeesingh said the state of COVID-19 care was poor and challenged Deyalsingh to publish the mortality rate of patients admitted to Intensive Care Units.
I n his maiden contribution, Government Senator Muhammad Yunus Ibrahim suggested that Gopeesingh continued the United National Congress (UNC) Monday Night Forum. Ibrahim recalled seeing viral videos during the UNC’s 2020 General Election campaign where there was no social distancing and people did not wear masks, creating possible super spreader events. He said that the People’s National Movement kept its campaign virtual.
He also recalled that Gopeesingh contracted COVID-19 and upon recovering, heaped commendation, praise and gratitude on the parallel healthcare system that he condemned yesterday.
“I do not know if the long-term effect of long COVID is memory,” Ibrahim said.
Responding to Gopeesingh’s criticism of his three former students, Ibrahim recalled this was also Opposition Leader Kamla Persad-Bissessar’s position.
Ibrahim said he studied with these professionals and could speak to their calibre, competence and levels of service.
He said Chief Medical Officer (CMO) Dr Roshan Parasram, Technical Director of the Epidemiology Division Dr Avery Hinds and Principal Medical Officer Dr Maryam Abdool-Richards excelled in medicine.
He said they received scholarships and grants to pursue Masters programmes.
“To come down on them in such a manner is to breed havoc, doubt and lack of competence which undermines the man on the streets’ thinking of who is responsible for their lives.”
Regarding Gopeesingh’s criticism that the Ministry was not using several drugs in its COVID-19 care, Ibrahim said they were not approved by the World Health Organisation.
He said the Government would not use citizens as guinea pigs.