Minister for Health Joe Cassar did well to point out in your last issue that the most serious difficulty in making improvements in the services provided at Mater Dei Hospital was the obstructive attitude of the professional unions concerned.

It has been so and will continue to be so long as these unions or associations are led by persons more suited to be factory floor officials than leaders of caring professions who should keep foremost in mind the well being of vulnerable patients and their anxious families.

The terms and conditions of service currently applicable to doctors and nurses in the public health service cannot by any stretch of the imagination be described as mean or exploitative. Yet, in most if not in every instance when the Minister tries to address the problems besetting the service at Mater Dei Hospital, he comes up against a brick wall invariably set up by the unions.

At a time when our welfare services are at serious risk of being severely reduced, resulting from the present euro crisis (Moody’s took Malta’s economy rating down a notch today), it is sad to see the leaders of unions serving our caring professions showing such a narrow, selfish sectoral vision.

They are unworthy of the Maltese nursing and medical professions.

Prof. J. A. Muscat

TA’ XBIEX