Senior journo condemns poor health care system

By ANGELINE KARIUS
A SENIOR journalist has condemned the poor health care system in the country in light of the death of colleague and friend, the late Yehiura Angwi Hriehwazi.
The National newspaper editor-in-chief Frank Senge Kolma said at the funeral service yesterday in Port Moresby Hriehwazi, who passed away early on Sunday January 8, could have been saved if the health system had been working and reliable.
Hriehwazi, who died from a heart attack, was the Business Editor of the newspaper.
He said his colleague was one journalist who used to highlight PNG’s poor health system in the media. 
“As a journalist, Yehi reported and commented on the appalling state of health care in the country. Eventually falling victim to it,” he said.
He said Hriehwazi with his family had spent most of the previous day trying to find expert help.
“He did not find it. So he returned home and tried to rest but in the end that was too much.
“He surrendered his life on a bed in PNG’s biggest hospital, with doctors and nurses trying to revive his heart when he was already brain-dead. 
“Yehi has become another victim of the madness that we call public health care in this country.
“A man in his prime, so full of life and with so much to contribute, taken from life because we have a poor public health system.”
Kolma warned that more people could become victims of the system like Yehi.
“We must have good reliable health care, despite the kind of lifestyle and work habits,’’ he said.
“That is a common denominator in all societies.
“In a country so rich, in a country so blessed this state of affairs is a travesty. It is tragic. It is neglect by successive governments – that is criminal.”