The Sars outbreak is a wake-up call for our health-care system. It has also laid bare the inability of the administration to cope with an onerous crisis. Now that the World Health Organisation has lifted the travel warning on Hong Kong, signalling the worst is over, it is time to recollect what happened, face the unpalatable truths, learn the lesson and work out a blueprint for health-care reform.

The administration may have taken one step forward in learning lessons from the Sars outbreak, by setting up a review committee. But the fact that it is headed by the Secretary for Health, Welfare and Food, Yeoh Eng-kiong, has drawn scepticism rather than applause. The committee will examine Hong Kong's health-care system, including the operations of the Department of Health and the Hospital Authority, and whether the Sars outbreak was handled properly. It will make recommendations on how similar crises should be handled in the future.

Given Dr Yeoh's decision-making role in handling the Sars outbreak, it is only natural to question the impartiality and credibility of the committee he will lead. The potential conflict of interest can best be avoided by appointing, instead, a panel of independent experts to do the work. The committee's lack of legal powers to summon witnesses and seize confidential documents has also brought its efficacy into question.

As early as March 12, Chung Sheung-chee, dean of the faculty of medicine at the Chinese University of Hong Kong, advised the administration to close the Prince of Wales Hospital, but was unheeded. Similarly, on March 21, the chief executive of the Hospital Authority, William Ho Shiu-wei, warned the disease had spread into the community and advised the administration to act quickly to prevent further transmission.

This advice was not followed, and the decision to suspend classes and introduce quarantine measures was taken only after the virus had moved even deeper into the community. With the benefit of hindsight, these were decisions that led to many deaths. If Dr Yeoh made these decisions, how can one expect him to conduct the investigation impartially? And how can one expect the decision-maker to declare that his own decisions were blunders?

It was alleged that factionalism within the Hospital Authority undermined the battle against Sars. Communication problems among the clusters brought into question the effectiveness of the Hospital Authority as a central co-ordinator. These are serious allegations that should be investigated by independent experts. Dr Yeoh's former post as the chief executive of the Hospital Authority surely renders him unsuitable for the job.

It would be more appropriate for the government to set up an independent commission under the Commission of Inquiry Ordinance, led by a judge and consisting of professionals. Independent commissions also have legal powers to summon witnesses, gain access to information and protect witnesses.

The commission should chronicle what happened, review the decisions made by the administration and look into the operations of the Health Department and the Hospital Authority.

The commission should also work out a blueprint for future health-care reform, including the dissemination of information about diseases between Hong Kong and the mainland, health checks across the border, preventive health-care reforms and reforms to cope with the emergence of infectious diseases.

Other areas of investigation include a comprehensive analysis of what went wrong, and recommendations about how similar crises should be handled in the future. Unfortunately, our call for an investigation into the facts and a blueprint for future reference have been dubbed witch-hunting. And what was meant to be fact-finding has been unfairly dismissed as merely fault-finding.

While the merits of setting up an independent commission are almost academic, the demerits of appointing Dr Yeoh to head the investigation are obvious to the man in the street. In a survey conducted by the Democratic Party, 52 per cent of respondents said Dr Yeoh should not head the committee. In fact, 79.6 per cent of the 1,238 respondents felt an independent panel should be formed to do the job. Clearly, people have much more confidence in an independent commission for this job.

Public opinion was mirrored in the Legco health services panel, which passed a non-binding motion on May 14 calling for the establishment of a select committee to investigate government officials and Hospital Authority executives. Whether a select committee will be set up will be decided at the coming House Committee meeting.

Last week, Sars victims and their families at Amoy Gardens petitioned for an independent inquiry to be set up by Legco. They questioned the credibility and impartiality of Dr Yeoh to investigate decisions that he and his bureau made. The administration owes them an explanation and a fair judgment as to what went wrong and who was to blame, and the victims are not going to take this silently.

Justice has to be seen to be done, and the public interest is a value far higher than the notion of official infallibility. If we are to cope with similar crises properly, we cannot afford to lose sight of any of these lessons. They can only be learned from an impartial and comprehensive investigation conducted by independent, credible experts.

YEUNG SUM

Chairman of the Democratic Party and a directly elected Legislative

Councillor

[South China Morning Post, May 27, 2003]