Alliance for Patient Safety

Amiad Taub:

The truth is that I planned to say something. I don't understand what you have said now Bezalel. If somebody failed; they are talking with you here about submitted figures. Those 11,500 files, out of which six, it is 0.00 something, six physicians were permanently suspended, some on drugs. Is it legitimate? Can it be that on a matter like this conclusions are drawn? You have trust in a system that shows figures like that? Incidentally, in all models showing risk management, of the tip of the iceberg, Heinrich, they are talking about crazy numbers of cases which were not investigated; i.e. if 11,500 cases were submitted we have tens of thousands which were not investigated at all and not submitted. Of all these figures, with these results, are you in doubt that they are preventing the next medical negligence? I have no doubt that it is not happening. I want to start with this —

Bezalel Smotrich (Habait Hayehudi):

Put your finger on the point. Why it's happening? Indeed I didn't say that the data is good —

Amiad Taub:

Because the commission is not doing its job, by not establishing enough committees and the results of its investigations are not enough, and it takes years to investigate things and years until things happen, so in the bottom line that's what happens.

Bezalel Smotrich (Habait Hayehudi):

To this issue I didn't relate to, Amiad.

Amiad Taub:

And in such way the next event is not prevented.

Bezalel Smotrich (Habait Hayehudi):

Why it is connected to what I have said?

Amiad Taub:

It's clear that it is connected, because the moment you say that the Ministry of Health, the commission, are doing a wonderful job and I have complete trust in the medical system, it is obvious that you won't take it out.

Bezalel Smotrich (Habait Hayehudi):

I have trust in the medical system, I haven't spoken about the commission. I did not have a meeting with the commission. With the medical system I have trust because —

Amiad Taub:

Then I say; the moment the data tell a different story it should be investigated.

Bezalel Smotrich (Habait Hayehudi):

Boaz said that the public has no trust in the medical system, then I —

Amiad Taub:

And with a good reason; I want to start with this, that I think that it is shameful that only you came to this discussion. A discussion about saving lives. We should have here Knesset members in the committee.

The Chairperson, Karin Elharar:

No Amiad. I really say. This is the second time that I am dealing with this matter. It is a discussion that is not at all in the Knesset regular sessions. It is an important discussion. The one who came, came and the one that did not come, could be that he is discussing these issues in —

Amiad Taub:

We have spoken to him. He is running around in ceremonies and primaries and such, therefore — we have checked; we approached Knesset members. At the end of the previous discussion the Committee Press Office distributed —

The Chairperson, Karin Elharar:

Elections were announced? They did not tell me.

Amiad Taub:

What?

The Chairperson, Karin Elharar:

I am asking whether elections were announced; they haven't told me.

Call:

We smell the elections on the horizon.

Amiad Taub:

At the end of the previous discussion the Committee Press Office distributed an announcement to the media with the attached presentation of the commission in which we discovered that the commission has the authority to suspend physicians' licenses in exceptional events. Knesset member Elharar actually applied and asked to clarify why it has not been done in the case of Ofek Taub and she was answered that these physicians were not prone to making mistakes. This is a quote of what they have answered. And the second thing, in this specific case, one more time a quote from Dr. Lev: "Even the possibility for their suspension for the sake of investigation was not examined, according to Clause 44a."

And I want to check whether six physicians, who the Prosecution have found that they deserved to be put on trial, on ignorance, forgery, cover-up and injury to an innocent boy; is there not the slightest doubt that maybe they should have been suspended for an investigation in order that it will not happen again to others? And whether anyone sitting here in the room would be ready that a Professor that assigned children to an operating room for adults, a day after that, will assign his child to an operating room; and if anyone of you who saw a warning that has been ignored, thus we might see each other in the next tragedy of connecting children to CO2 after a case of almost a tragedy, is he ready that this physician will perform surgery on him a month later? These are the physicians who are not prone to making mistakes? Physicians who forged reports three times are not prone to making mistakes?

I want to tell you that I don't understand how you sleep at night. Really; the fact that you are ignoring and protecting them causes harm to other people. I believe that none of you would put his child into a car whose brakes are out of order, or allow his child to ride with a drunken driver, and this is exactly what you are doing in the case of health. A soldier, who erroneously discharged a bullet, is debriefed, investigated and they take his weapon. Here the people are shooting bullets, hitting, killing people and nothing; and the junta protects its members, what is known as, tell me who your friends are and I shall tell you who you are.

And the answers from the commission in my view attest that aside of the art of cover-up nothing here makes progress. In the army in every case of almost injured they stop to investigate. In the air force debriefings are conducted on events of almost injuries caused in a simulators, not during a flight where they passed close to each other, also in simulators where errors were made, they stop and check and conduct a debriefing. Even in the Ossem group —

Call:

Without punishment.

Amiad Taub:

Let me finish. I did not interrupt you. In Ossem, when a failure occurs, automatically, within 24 hours, they have to issue a report with all the data and documents and provide it to the Nestle world Company. In such way they prevent the next occurrences. In the case of Ofek, for example, they have ventilated him with carbon – dioxide, but it took five months until they have replaced the taps; and it took two years until they received the recommendations to appoint a physician who will be in charge of the operating room. What had happened during these two years? What happens in these five months? Who is supposed to protect the public if not you?

The Chairperson, Karin Elharar:

Thanks.

Amiad Taub:

No, I have more, please.

The Chairperson, Karin Elharar:

We said two minutes.

Amiad Taub:

Then I shall make it short. I shall make it short and finish by this, that between the story of Ofek there is a sharp and clear line to what we are asking, and the State Comptroller's words are trustful with us, who said that there is a concern of institutional conflict of interests, and that the commission cannot be situated in the Ministry of Health and physicians will protect physicians. We are the public, and we have not a drop of trust, not in the commission and not in the Ministry of Health. They have our family members, not because of errors, but because negligence which is criminal, which should have been mandatory to be prevented, and which was stuck in your system one hundred percent — nothing had happened to all of these team members. Had you conducted it with the appropriate severity with these physicians, it might be that some of us would not be sitting here today.

I am announcing in public, what is known as in front of all of you, and I am finishing with it, on behalf of the campaign headquarters that we have set up, that the era in which they are deciding on our affairs without involving us in the process, is over. You will not pass a law that you are promoting without us being partners to this. On behalf of the injured that have no mouth we shall fight together. The law in its present form, as it has been proposed, with the five principles you mentioned which were attached to the shameful data they indicated, will not pass in the Israeli Knesset, or if I shall use a term that you know and understand, then over our dead bodies. Fine? It will not pass as is. If you will not cooperate with us, this law will not pass. We will go to every Knesset member and every newspaper and every website and shall invest our money in campaigns and lawyers and lobbyists, and will do everything necessary in order that there will be a commission which is independent and which has teeth, because we are not ready that more citizens will go through what we are passing and have passed.