[Russell]

See: TT Express 2009-07-26 - where I give it to Imbert:


"Colm Imbert, in a report in the Express on July23, said that there were 2,400 medical posts unfilled, and half ofthose (that is 1,200) represented a chronic shortage. MrImbert-formerly a health minister back in 2003-reminds us that thechronic shortage of doctors in T&T existed before 2003 and as farback as the 1950s. What an admission of gross maladministration andincompetence!

Does Mr Imbert, in his current role, realise that he has admitted togross neglect of the country's health system across two terms of hisGovernment? Why on earth in 2009-at least six years after hisGovernment decided to import doctors in large numbers-are they stillwrestling with such a ridiculous shortage of doctors?

Let us recall that Mr Imbert's solution to the doctor shortage backin 2003 was to import Cuban and other foreign doctors- whilst kickinghome-grown doctors in the teeth. But that was not some new kind of"treatment". It has been going on for several decades.

You may think that with 2,400 vacant medical posts in T&T thatthe Government or the health authorities might have filled theirwebsites with advertisements for at least the most urgent-to-fillposts? We should expect in the order of 1,200 advertisements acrosshealth service websites. Guess how many are advertised as of July 23,2009? One! One single advertisement at the South West Regional HealthAuthority's website-none on any other health-related Trinbagonianwebsite. Perhaps all 2,400 jobs are advertised on a Cuban website. Idid not have the time or energy to check, and I do not speak or readSpanish.

Mr Imbert has now proven me right by his latest utterances. In myletter to the Express on January 8, 2003, I said, "The fighting-talk tobring in Cuban doctors is a poor imitation of Thatcher's strategy, todeal with striking miners in England. It will fail miserably inTrinidad. There is no way that the Government can find enough Cubandoctors within a few months who will pass medical registrationrequirements and have sufficient linguistic competence and culturalawareness to function properly."

It was certainly not months.Here we are, six years later, with Imbert and his merry men makingstrenuous efforts, yet again, to avoid the issue of linguisticcompetence (inter alia) by passing a new law. No, Mr Imbert, you andyour brethren will learn in due course that the recipe is not "a lawfor a flaw".

I predict that the likes of Mr Imbert will now sex up the wholematter and further inveigle the Government to pass legislation in orderbully the medical profession, yet again. Young and middle-aged doctorswill take flight from T&T in greater numbers. To where? Australia,New Zealand and Alberta, in Canada. These are the regions in the worldwhere they are wooing high-calibre doctors. T&T's home-growndoctors will flourish in those countries. Many are there already anddoing quite well. They do not want to return to the "comess" andconfusion. Who will fill the vacant posts left behind? Local doctorswill and be replaced largely by a cheaper, hyper-obedient, importedworkforce.

It appears to me that Imbert is bent again on aping, as he did in2003, the strategies used by Thatcher (in England). He comes nowherenear Mrs Thatcher's intellectual prowess in her heyday. I said in 2003that Imbert was living in cloud cuckoo land. It seems that he has nowtaken up permanent residence there-and now he has company! Happy, theyall are. Sad will be the people of T&T who expect high-quality,first-world-like health services on the approach to 2020.


Dr Russell D Lutchman

MRCPsych LLB(Hons) ACMI

Consultant Forensic Psychiatrist

London, UK"