The Muscat Syndrome is spreading far and wide within the government’s Cabinet of Ministers and Members of Parliament. It starts with employing people of trust by the dozens. It goes on to serve the media and Parliament with half-truths... which eventually become blatant lies.

For example: On World Cancer Day, the health minister Chris Fearne announced the introduction of three new medicines for cancer patients. It then turned out that these are not new at all. They are medicines which were already on the medicines formulary. What has actually changed is the protocol which determines how and to whom these medicines are dispensed.

For some reason, Fearne was not satisfied with announcing a change in the protocol. He felt he had to announce something bigger. “New cancer medicines” sounds grand but it is fake. It's a lie.

You would have thought that, on World Cancer Day, Fearne could have (and should have) announced the publication of the “new” national cancer plan. The first one, published by the previous Government, expired in 2015. That's a long time without a plan.

I have been asking parliamentary questions in relation to this document on a regular basis. Two years ago, in February 2015, Fearne announced that the plan would be published shortly. Perhaps I should have followed up with a question about the meaning of shortly. After all, this government is brazen enough to boast about a still inoperative power station that is two years past its deadline.

In May 2016, after numerous unanswered questions, Fearne informed Parliament that the document would be published later that same year.

This week, two months into the following year, he informed Parliament (again in reply to my parliamentary question) that the cancer plan will be published in the first days of March. Once again, we will wait and see.

Another example of the Muscat Syndrome in the health sector: Not too long ago, I wrote in this space that Fearne is keeping his post as paediatric surgeon at Mater Dei available for himself. Apparently, he is not that sure about a Labour victory in a few months' time. Fearne did not deny what I said through an official press release. He preferred to use Muscat’s lackey (paid from our taxes), Glen Bedingfield, to attack my credibility on the internet.

I stand by what I said. Today, there is only one paediatric surgeon at Mater Dei when, on paper, there should be two. When I challenged Fearne about this matter last Thursday, on RTK, he started throwing about names of surgeons who are no longer part of Mater Dei Hospital’s staff. But the real giveaway was when he told me that this was no issue because he was a paediatric surgeon on his own for ten years!

The Muscat Syndrome can also show itself through silence when explanations are called for. This week I spoke in Parliament about an accident affecting IVF treatment following a cut in the power supply.

On 26th January, Fearne issued a statement stating that there was “possible technical damage” in the embryo incubator at Mater Dei Hospital. At the time, the incubator contained some twenty embryos. Eight couples going through the IVF process were affected by this. Although Fearne’s press release had insensitively stated that the embryos were “viable”, none of the eight couples had a successful pregnancy.

I have been contacted by these couples, who are totally distraught. Financially, the incident has cost each couple some €4,000 in medicines. Emotionally, it has devastated them.

Nobody is informing them about what really happened. What they really want to know is what went wrong on that fatal day. Fearne’s silence on this matter is very telling. He should at least announce when the inquiry will come to a close. There are so many unanswered questions.

The couples were asked to sign that they accept the embryo transfer knowing of the technical fault. One couple told me, “What did they expect us to do? Refuse the embryos which could have been our children?”

Of course, I will continue to push for the inquiry results to be published. But I fear that we may never know the truth. Unfortunately we have a government which believes that if you tell the same lie enough times, people will believe it; and the bigger the lie, the better.

It is a government that acts as though it also believes that the truth is the greatest enemy of the State. So I appeal to the media not to let go. I do not think of the press as a great keyboard on which the government can play. Muscat and his close friends do.