SGH Hep C Case: I don't want to hear you complain, you voted for this.

Hello everyone. I have seen a Facebook exchange between a Singaporean mate of mind and some of his Facebook friends - he confessed that he voted for the PAP in the recent elections and in light of the SGH Hep C scandal, he now regrets his choice in hindsight. Well, hindsight is always 2020 but his friends did lay into him with a lot of "I told you so" and "you Singaporeans voted for this, I don't want to hear you complain, you voted for this!" In his defence, he is a well-educated guy who is not blindly supporting the PAP out of sheer fanaticism, he made an informed decision based on the candidates presented. His PAP MP had done a reasonable job thus far and was a very credible candidate and in sharp contrast, the opposition candidate was not as credible and didn't have an impressive track record. Thus it was in this context that he voted for the PAP candidate, maintaining the status quo (and now, to his credit, he regrets it).

I have talked about the this problem on my blog: about how intelligent, capable people are shunning opposition politics in Singapore because of the uphill struggle they are presented. I would have hoped that at least some are trying to work within the system to challenge the way the PAP functions, but the SGH Hep C scandal shows you why it is necessary to have a credible opposition in Singapore to hold the government to account when things do go horribly wrong. As it is, the government thinks that it can get away with anything and everything - including delaying the media reporting this scandalous cover up until after the general elections, just in case it may inspire the voters to vote for the opposition. In the meantime, more innocent patients get infected by Hep C at SGH and so far four have died.

Note the way I have chosen the word 'scandal' instead of 'outbreak' to describe the situation at SGH - allow me to explain why. The word outbreak can be used to describe when there is a sudden spread of a disease within an area, but this implies that the disease is contagious. A good example of this the common flu, all it takes is for someone close to you to sneeze and you are exposed to the influenza virus. However, Hep C is not easily spread like that - it is spread through blood-to-blood contact associated with intravenous drug use, poorly sterilized medical equipment and blood transfusions. And when this happens in a renal ward (ie. a ward treating patients with kidney ailments), it means one thing: someone (or a small group of people) messed up real bad when they were treating the patients at the ward. It could be the doctors or nurses or any other support worker responsible for ensuring that the sanitizing all medical equipment: we don't know the precise details as SGH doesn't know how this massive mistake has transpired yet, they are still busy investigating the case.  The public does want heads to roll, we want to know who to blame for this mess.

But one thing is clear: you don't 'catch' Hep C by sharing a sofa with a patient who has Hep C, or say using the same sink: no, there has got to be blood-to-blood contact.  This is why the majority of new cases diagnosed are amongst those who take drugs and share needles; sexual contact (leading to blood to blood exposure), exposure during healthcare procedures and even during procedures like tatooing or piercing (aka 'body modification) can lead to Hep C transmission. Thus it is wrong to call the current situation an 'outbreak' - it is a cover up of a series of terrible mistakes made by a small group of healthcare professionals at SGH. Now you can argue, that this has nothing to do with politics. Chances are, such a mistake was made by a bunch of nurses (who may be local or foreign), there is even a possibility that the people responsible for this may be opposition supporters. But let me ask you this: if the government was willing to cover this up for four months until after the election, what else have they been hiding from the public? What else are they willing to hide from the public? This goes to show that the government's priority is their image rather than the truth - this is when trust breaks down between a government and the people.

Am I telling you anything you don't know already? No. Hardly. For a long time, Singaporeans have been suspicious of the information the government releases about the haze situation and many have turned to a range of apps to find out about the air quality rather than rely on the official PSI index. Now you may ask yourself, why would the government have any incentive to lie about the haze situation, given that we all know the smoke originates from Indonesia? Simple: firstly, the government is powerless to do anything about the situation apart from putting pressure on the Indonesian authorities (who honestly don't give a toss what the Singaporean government says). Secondly, there may be Singaporean companies and business interests linked companies responsible for the haze in Indonesia, which if revealed to be the case, can be another case of, "well then, why can't we deal with these culprits in Singapore then?"

Cough, choke, hazy Singapore... 

Thirdly, there are Singaporeans who do expect the wonderful PAP to simply wave a magic wand and clear the air up just like that - yes there are Singaporeans who have such faith in the government. A journalist friend of mine actually told me this story - she worked at the ST during a particularly bad haze season and she received a call one morning in the news desk (phone numbers are available on the SPH website). This irate older Singaporean went on an epic rant and said something like, "you people have the cheek to call yourself the Straits Times, what are you intending to do about the haze? You are reporters, you have access to the top people in government. You must go to the Parliament of Singapore and speak to the MPs, the ministers. You must go to the Istana, get hold of important people in the PAP and ask them to do something about it! I am an ordinary Singaporean, I cannot just march up to the Istana and demand to speak to the president. They can solve the haze today, before lunchtime if you make them do it!" 

What did my ST journalist friend do? She put the irate gentleman on speaker phone so her colleagues around could have a good laugh and then very diplomatically and very politely, she told him, "thank you very much for your call sir, we will try our best to speak to the authorities to get the answers you want. Thank you for reading the ST." The fact is many Singaporeans grossly overestimate the ability of the PAP to deal anything and everything under the sun - thus the PAP starts covering up areas where they cannot solve problems in order to avoid disappointing such PAP supporters: it is a vicious cycle. The fact that these PAP supporters rarely hear any bad news in the tightly controlled media means that they believe that they are living in some kind of ideal country, a tropical paradise where things simply do not go wrong. Guys, you live in a free country: by all means, support the PAP if you like them and that is what you want to do, but don't do it on the false premise that they have a magic wand to solve all your problems.

In the meantime, allow me to repeat what so many Singaporeans have said on social media already. "You voted for this, 70% of you voted for this. I don't want to hear you guys complain anymore. You got what you voted for."  The cover ups will continue - this is just one incident that finally saw the light of day, one wonders what other skeletons are hidden in the closet?  Let me know your thoughts on the issue, leave your comments below. Many thanks for reading.