Visa processing delay frustrates medical scheme staff

By SUSAN MERRELL
DELAYS in processing Australian travel visas has long caused frustration among Papua New Guineans, no less so than in the Solomon Islands where Australian travel visas are processed through Port Moresby.
Last week, things took a sinister turn, as the persistent delays became life threatening for a Melanesian brother.
When Katalake, a 37-year-old father of four arrived at St Vincent’s Hospital in Sydney last week – on his own, from Honiara – he was very sick.
With an easily treatable kidney blockage, a week’s delay obtaining a travel visa had escalated his condition to life threatening; his medical escort’s visa never eventuated.
A senior kidney specialist at the hospital, Dr Jacob Sevastos, explained that while waiting for the travel document, Katalake’s bodily potassium increased to a level where a cardiac arrest was not just a possibility but merely a matter of time. 
“He is a very lucky boy,” Sevastos said.
For Sir Trevor Garland, honorary consul-general to the Solomon Islands in Sydney and the administrator of the 25-year-old programme between St Vincent’s Hospital and the Solomon Islands, this scenario is all too familiar.
“I don’t know what they want anymore,” he said of the Australian Department of Immigration and Citizenship in Port Moresby.
“Every time I make an application there is yet another requirement.”
“I’m starting to believe that they are deliberately obstructive.”
In an email to Pilar Davidson, first secretary (immigration) and principal migration officer (integrity) in Port Moresby, Sir Trevor stated that in the case of Katalake he was “…appalled at (her) lack of compassion,” as she pursued her ever-increasing red tape and time-delaying requirements that were lessening  Katalake’s chances of recovery. 
On his eventual arrival in Sydney, Katalake underwent emergency dialysis and will receive more later as doctors seek to normalise his elevated potassium levels so that they can start the treatment that should have begun a week ago.
Although in excellent medical hands, the delay in recei­ving treatment has also increased Katalake’s chances of a life-threatening infection.
The doctors at St Vincent’s are braced for it.
Davidson was unavailable for comment. Her voicemail stated she would be “out of the office” until March 5.