Race has no place in surgical priorities and the Government should immediately drop ethnicity as one of the criteria surgeons have been told to use to rank patients, National’s Health spokesperson Dr Shane Reti says.

“While there has been historical inequity that has disadvantaged Māori and Pasifika people, the idea that any government would deliberately rank ethnicities for priority for surgery is offensive, wrong and should halt immediately.

“The way to improve Māori and Pasifika health is through better housing, education and addressing the cost of living, not by disadvantaging others.

“As a doctor, I would refuse to rank patients based on their ethnicity and I completely side with surgeons who are alarmed and affronted by this priority tool implemented by Health New Zealand.

“A National government would not rank patients by ethnicity.”