Today, we turn our sights on the Irish National Health Service (which is apparently not all that "vaunted"). It seems that they have a little problem of their own:
Now, it may not seem like 7 out of 3,000 is that big a deal (after all, it's less than 2/10's of 1%). Of course, it's certainly a big deal for those women who were given the incorrect results, but taken as a whole, it wouldn't seem that significant.
Except for this:
"Then as the situation further evolved, we learned how there were problems with dirt, with 16-year-old machines."
As Bill has noted before, sanitation is not a high priority in these kinds of systems, so it's not necessarily a big surprise that the equipment is ill-maintained. But if the machines are dirty, the folks who run them are filthy:
"(A) surgeon in the hospital had expressed concerns about radiological service as far back as July 2005. He had particularly pinpointed inexperienced staff."
And it gets worse:
"Patients are devastated and are getting it from every angle; overcrowded Accident and Emergency (A&E) departments, patients on trolleys, hygiene problems...we still get calls every day from patients about things as basic as dirty bathrooms, handwashing facilities and towels."
By all means, let's do that here.
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