The Government has no extra funding for cancer treatment but has splashed $4.3 million on consultancy fees for its ill-conceived health system restructuring plan, says National’s Health spokesperson Dr Shane Reti.

In July Australia was on track to authorise 1300 GPs so they could administer the Pfizer vaccine, yet New Zealand still hasn’t recognised GPs as an important tool in our vaccine rollout, National’s Health spokesperson Dr Shane Reti says.

Another year of the Government’s failed influenza vaccination programme will cost lives, says National’s Health spokesperson Dr Shane Reti.

It is hard to believe that, five months after Delta hit New Zealand arrived and after five weeks of lockdown, that the visitor policies of Auckland’s three district health boards are yet to be figured out, says National’s Health spokesperson Dr Shane Reti.

Middlemore Hospital is in the highest risk area in the current Covid outbreak and needs leadership from the Minister of Health – not abdication of responsibility, says National’s Health spokesperson Dr Shane Reti.

Despite questions in Parliament yesterday, intense media interest in the matter today, and advanced notice that I was going to return to the issue today, Minister of Health Andrew Little still hasn’t bothered to find out the most important details about the Covid-positive patient at Middlemore Hospital, National’s Health spokesperson Dr Shane Reti says.

If the Minister of Health is taking seriously the situation at Middlemore Hospital where a Covid-positive patient was placed in a general ward with three other patients, why has he been unable to provide any details as to the impact of the incident on the hospital and workforce, National’s Health spokesperson Dr Shane Reti says.

New Zealand’s low vaccination rate can also be credited to late and lazy engagement with primary care providers such as pharmacies, says National’s Health spokesman Dr Shane Reti.

The Government must explain why the health system was so unprepared for a Delta outbreak and why no new ICU bed spaces were provisioned over the five months since Delta first appeared in our MIQ facilities, National’s Health spokesperson Dr Shane Reti says.