STEP FORWARD: On May 30, 2011 Social Affairs Committee of the Estonian Parliament decided to create a special working group after the committee extended session that discussed the ongoing claims about medical errors in Estonia, abuse of patients and lack of patients rights. Estonian Patients Advocacy Association requests that the 72-year old ex-communist long time health quality claims supervisor Peeter Mardna will be exluded from the work of the commission due to repeated violation of legislation and personal help to cover up the medical errors and punish with lies and public humilation the patients and their relatives who have dared to disclose the abuse cases.
Regardless of many stories, incl. by leading Estonian daily Postimees about brutal treatment of patients in Estonian hospitals, regardless of hundreds of similar cases patients or their relatives wrote at Postimees net site after the daily disclosed my letter about the brutality my son faced at the Tallinn biggest hospital where he perished in autumn 2009, regardless of study up at Tartu University site that estimates at least 1500 people die every year due to medical mistakes in Estonia, a country of just 1.3 million people, the ex-career communist, Prime Minister Andrus Ansip whose Reform Party supervises also Social Ministry and health care, sees no problem as he stated again to parliament in spring 2011. Lets hope the international pressure will from now on force also Estonian government to admit the cruel reality. Head of Estonian Patient Advocacy Association Pille Ilves, quoted in AFP article on May 16, 2011 below, told me that the estimated number of 1500 people perishing every year due to medical errors in Estonia, is not correct - Ilves said that the actual number is much bigger than that because unlike developed countries the post-Soviet Estonia lacks many basic patient safety and hospital responsility mechanisms, common in West Europe and US. Links to AFP story "Hospital candid camera scandal rocks Estonia" are in links list right.
Illegal chaining of patients in Tallinn hospitals, violent euthanasia, fatal errors, freezing of disabled, lack of objective quality and complaints control, ignoring UN criticism and Patient Advocacy Association. Struggle for Patient Rights Law. Corruption in Estonian medicine, threats and Soviet-style cover-up. Our horrible experiences from Tallinn hospitals.
