THE PRESS THURSDAY, JULY 27, 1989. Not just Hanmer’s hospital

Press, 27 July 1989, Page 12

THE PRESS THURSDAY, JULY 27, 1989. Not just Hanmer’s hospital

The people of Hanmer Springs township are preparing to fight the possibility that the Queen Mary Hospital will be closed. The proposal is part of the Canterbury Area Health Board’s programme to cut costs to satisfy the Government’s requirements. The hospital is an important part of the township’s economic and communal life. The threat to the hospital is a threat to the township and it is not hard to sympathise with the residents, who fear that their community will be hit hard if the hospital has to be closed. Their arguments are just, but no more so than the arguments that can be advanced for rejecting almost any of the dozens of reductions in health services planned or being considered throughout the country. Fortunately for the people of Hanmer Springs, they need not rely solely on the parochial argument. A far more telling and convincing reason for. retaining Queen Mary Hospital lies in the fact that it is'not simply a rural facility, but the national alcohol and drug treatment centre. Queen Mary Hospital serves hot just Hanmer Springs and not just the region covered by the Canterbury Area Health' Board. It serves the whole of the country. It is central to the treatment and rehabilitation of hundreds of New Zealanders who fall victim each year to alcohol and other drug dependency, and who fail to succeed with simpler treatment closer to home. Perhaps it could be demonstrated that Queen Mary Hospital in this role never should have been a charge on the local board;.so it should not be a part of local costcutting. Certainly a sound case can be made for retaining Queen Mary Hospital as a national centre. Each year about 800 patients are treated at this hospital, about a fifth of them coming from Canterbury. The average course of treatment is six weeks. The routine waiting time for patients is three to four months, and at times more than 300 people with alcohol and drug problems have been waiting for admission to the 115-bed hospital. Queen Mary Hospital is no extravagance. Last year its expenditure was under its budget. It would

earn more if other area health boards were charged a more realistic fee for the patients from regional populations other than Canterbury’s, and for whom the other area health boards have received allowances jn their annual budget allocations.

The most telling figures are not dollars and cents in the hospital accounts, however, but the number of patients waiting for admission and the number of months it takes to get them admitted. Last year, a Christchurch conference ' on psychiatric epidemiology was told that New Zealand, and Christchurch in particular, has among the highest rates of alcohol abuse and dependence in the Western world. The Alcoholic Liquor Advisory Council estimates that 5 per cent of the workforce, or about 60,000 people, are affected by alcohol-related problems. The cost to the economy, from accidents, from lost production, and from lost income is put conservatively at more than $lOO million a year. By comparison, the $3.6 million annual budget’ of Queen Mary Hospital pales. It is not the only budget to help those who have drug problems. Other institutions and services play their part, especially in the first levels of treatment and in care afterwards. Nevertheless, this hospital’s role suggests not that the hospital should be closed but rather that it should be expanded.

The social costs of excessive drinking are acknowledged to be high, but no community has yet found a civilised way of preventing a proportion of drinkers, becoming medical and social problems. The alcohol and drug dependence that Queen Mary Hospital is battling is not as eye-catching, nor as newsworthy, nor as exciting to the public’s imagination as many other medical problems of the day; yet it is probably the biggest single health problem confronting the country’s health services. Failing to recognise this is short-sighted to say the least of it. The Government should recognise the special, national. role of Queen Mary Hospital and make financial provision for it accordingly.