THE Sarawak Health Department’s response to allegations of data manipulation on the bed occupancy rate in Sibu Hospital is unsatisfactory, said Bukit Assek assemblyman Irene Chang.

The department’s dismissal of the claims, which were made anonymously by a doctor to health website CodeBlue on Wednesday, does not ease public concern, she added.

“It should give a true picture of the battle against Covid-19 in Sibu and state of the healthcare system in our hospitals.”

In the letter, the doctor claimed that the bed occupancy rate in Covid-19 wards in Sibu Hospital has exceeded 100%, with a single ward meant to admit 20 to 30 patients forced to accept up to 50 patients.

The doctor alleged that the reason why bed utilisation is not stated as 100% on paper is because “top management is allegedly manipulating the denominator of bed capacities”.

The medical practitioner also claimed that there is data manipulation of intensive care unit (ICU) use in the state.

“In reality, we do not have many available ICU beds (by ICU beds, we mean a physical bed, staff nurses, monitoring and ventilator).”

The doctor said in a day, up to 15 Covid-19 patients will be stranded for several hours in the emergency department while awaiting bed availability. Some patients have to wait for up to 12 hours, and the number of stranded patients is increasing.

Chang said the lengthy letter with detailed scenarios deserves a better response from the state health department.

Instead, she added, the department dismissed it by saying bed availability is “dynamic and will change according to circumstances”.

The DAP assemblyman said failure to provide a proper explanation may give an impression that the data has indeed been manipulated, and not merely a presumption on the doctor’s part.

She added that the public already has a negative perception of Sibu Hospital as it is seen to be neglected.

“For decades, the hospital has been under-equipped and dependant on communities and corporations for consumables and medical equipment,” she said, pointing to the molecular lab with its polymerase chain reaction machines for Covid-19 screening as an example.

“The issue of healthcare worker shortage was already there even before Covid-19.”

Chang said the need for more manpower has intensified in the last two years due to the surge in Covid-19 cases. – October 2, 2021.