Postcard from St Helena
W HAT do you do if you live on a tiny island 2,000 miles out into the Atlantic and get sick? That’s a question the authorities have tried to answer since the days of the East India Company.
As well as a small hospital and an airport for emergencies, there’s also a system to bring in specialists on contract to handle routine work. And that’s where begins this saga, which sees many of us now victims of not just medical negligence but an abuse of power.
The health department hired Guatemalan orthopaedic surgeon Sergio Villatoro Bran in 2016. St Helena rarely gets the pick of overseas expertise, but Dr Bran initially seemed a very good investment, performing around 600 operations over three years – an astonishing number for a tiny place.