Safety concerns at Northern Beaches Hospital not addressed, auditor-general report finds

ABC NEWS (Australia)

A report by the NSW auditor-general has found Northern Beaches Hospital has not properly addressed safety concerns. The NSW government says it will accept the report's three recommendations. The report follows the death of two-year-old Joe Massa after he was treated at the hospital.

Transcript

00:00It's been a problematic partnership from the get-go.

00:05Now a scathing report says it's at risk of failure.

00:08The privatisation of public and acute hospital services like this way in New South Wales

00:14is not a model that should be operating again.

00:17Findings by the Auditor-General reveal Northern Beaches Hospital

00:20is not effectively delivering quality health services

00:23and has not sufficiently addressed clinical safety risks.

00:27This was a disastrous model that should never have been applied.

00:31Private operator HealthScope has been contracted to run the public portion

00:34of Northern Beaches Hospital until 2038.

00:38Today's report says that the state might need to take over public health services

00:42earlier than expected.

00:44Exiting these arrangements is very, very difficult.

00:48I'm reluctant to pay out 15 years worth of profit to that private company,

00:52particularly after the last year and a half.

00:54Among issues listed in the report was the failure to fix long-term problems

00:58with the hospital's electronic medical records system,

01:01which could result in important information not being fully considered

01:04in medical decision-making.

01:06The risk became a reality in September 2024,

01:09after the death of two-year-old Joe Massa,

01:12who was incorrectly triaged at the hospital's emergency department.

01:16The government has since introduced Joe's law

01:18to ban public-private hospital partnerships.

01:21This government, within the short term that it's been in power,

01:25has moved to legislate, has now moved to set up a task force

01:29to get this component of that hospital back into public hands.

01:33In a statement, HealthScope says it agrees the contractual arrangements

01:36with the government are severely challenged.

01:39HealthScope believes it is in the best interests of our staff

01:41and the broader community for an early hand-back of the public hospital.

01:45This is not the way healthcare in New South Wales should have worked

01:50and should be working.

01:51HealthScope has been recommended to resolve its issues by December this year.

01:55HealthScope is presented to the U.S. Watson

02:01You

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