Adequate treatment.

If you’ve checked any provincial or national news’ sites this week, you would have seen the latest scandal to plague the healthcare system. Only this time it takes place here in St. John’s.

A royal commission was launched after the government became aware of serious errors in breast cancer tests. Between 1997 and 2005, 1,013 women were subjected to faulty hormone testing.

The fallout? Some were told they had breast cancer when they didn’t. Others with breast cancer were told they were fine. Some were given inadequate treatment plans, while other perfectly healthy women underwent chemotherapy and mastectomies.

Mount Sinai found St. John's got it wrong for about a third of these patients. So 275 living patients didn't get the treatment they should have. As a result of discovering the error, about half of this group were then prescribed anti-hormone treatment. On March 18, 2008, a day before the beginning of the inquiry, the province confirmed that 108 patients who died did not get adequate treatment. In other words, 383 patients of 1,013 didn't get the treatment they should have.

It should also be noted that 50 women in Newfoundland and Labrador were mistakenly told they had advanced stages of breast cancer when they didn't. Some had mastectomies. The inquiry won't be addressing this problem specifically. [. . .]

The backlash from this discovery is going to be enormous in size. Every person who has been affected by this is going to seek retribution, and rightly so. But it does have the potential to get out of hand.

If you want to learn more, read one of the 158 news articles Google News links to.