“The main objective of every medical service to avoid illnesses or to cure a patient. However, health services may result in a number of problems to a client. A high percentage of accidents are caused by infections that one may take while receiving a treatment.” This was stated byMario Galea, Parliamentary Secretary for the Elderly and Community Care .

Parliamentary Secretary Galea said that “due to infections, patients may pass through additional sufferings and in certain instances may also lead to death. He recalled that as professioanlists in the health sector, the general public trusts us and never expect that accidents during the stage of curing patients can take place. When this happens, one loses faith in the health services”.

The Parliamentary Secretary added that this is a worldwide problem, capping also highly developed countries. According to WHO, every day, 1.4 million people are suffering from an infection which has been acquired whilst receiving treatment in the health sector.

He remarked that “until a few years ago everyone accepted the fact that infections acquired by patients during medical treatment could not be avoided, even though there already existed ways and means to prevent these infections. Today the idea about prevention of infections has drastically changed, since every infection can be avoided unless there is a specific reason.”

The Parliamentary Secretary for the Elderly and Community Care has encouraged the increase of awareness about practices that can help to reduce infections. The hands are a source of cross contamination of germs and viruses from one place to another, hence; from one person to another. Galea said that “patients’ relatives are urged to understand the importance of hand washing.”

The Parliamentary Secretary concluded “that in order to move forward in the protection of patients, there has to be a holistic input by all parties – ie. doctors, nurses, paramedics, care workers and cleaners. One has to further discuss ways of protecting our patients. It is important to reflect, ask and discuss when an infection was acquired. The idea is not to point fingers at, but to understand what happened and the reasons behind the happening to see how the occurance of such infection can be prevented in the future.”

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