Since I became the director of Galilee Medical Center in Nahariya 14 years ago, I have repeatedly seen how during election campaigns, the northern periphery is embraced with love, promises and visits from all sides, vowing to improve our woeful health situation. But then, when the victory celebrations are over – just like Cinderella who returns to her plain, simple self when the magic expires at midnight – we are once again left only with the promises.
Foreign Minister Yair Lapid once wrote an amusing piece in rhymed prose about things unique to Israel, with each stanza beginning with the phrase: “Only in Israel…” My own addition to that piece is: “Only in Israel can you get from one end to the other in just seven hours, but still have a healthcare ‘periphery.’”
Simply stated, in Israel there is a systematic and organized neglect of residents of the periphery in the matter of healthcare, leaving people to their fate by denying them equal access to availability of medical treatment, medical technologies and services.
Honestly, I often feel like we are fighting an uphill battle. The healthcare gap between the periphery and the center of the country only grows, despite the duty and responsibility of the regulator to oversee. The already insufferable gap continues to grow due to inaction, preoccupation with other matters, and a lack of understanding of the dire situation by the functionary whose raison d’etre is to ensure equal health care opportunity for the entire population.
I do not know why the system chooses to do one thing and not another, this is really not within my comprehension, but over the years the price, like the gap, becomes intolerable and unforgivable.
Take, for example, our medical center, a government hospital, which serves over 600,000 residents of the Galilee region, and is the second largest medical center north of Tel Aviv. The small increase of positions for medical staff that we recently received, does not begin to scratch the surface or even slightly fill the very basic shortages that we have lived with for so many years, and which scream out for immediate overhaul.
During the third wave of the COVID-19 pandemic, our medical center was one of the two most burdened with COVID-19 patients in the entire country; one week we had 120 patients hospitalized simultaneously in four different COVID-19 wards, with 25 in critical condition (intubated or on the verge of intubation). This was in addition to the regular patients, but of course it is no longer acceptable to discuss the complexity of their illnesses and the enormous energy required to treat them.
During that time, I felt that we had reached the red line marking the limits of our capabilities, and I had to instruct that all surgeries be halted, except in the case of dire emergencies. The reason was the absurd shortage of doctors and nurses, especially intensive care specialists, which also negatively impacted the treatment of critically ill COVID patients.
This crisis was noted in the news, but for most of the population it’s “in one ear and out the other.” Not so for the dozens of patients who had waited and waited for surgery that would offer them relief, but who now had to suffer the painful blow of postponement. I sincerely hope that in the current wave of the pandemic, we will not reach the same red line that we reached in the previous wave.
As the people of Israel mark the beginning of a New Year, I, as a messenger of the people seeking the services of the medical institution I head, can only hope that “beautiful and different will be the year that begins” – but no less importantly may it also be equal, just and worthy (healthcare-wise) for all of Israel’s citizens.
They all deserve it, even those who live in the periphery.
The writer, a professor, is director of Galilee Medical Center, Nahariya.