■ Whakatāne Mayor Victor Luca provides additional context and perspective on the letter by Aimee MacKenzie in the Beacon on July 2 entitled “We need doers, not divas”.

The letter referred to Sandy Milne’s intention to put his name forward as a councillor in the forthcoming local body elections and the fact that he intends to advocate for health, housing and education.

Should Sandy go through with his nomination, he is entitled to push any agenda he sees fit. However, I have warned him that the three areas are not core business for councils. That said, health, housing and education are also not none of council business either.

Ms MacKenzie seems to have taken umbrage to the fact that Mr Milne has been rather monotonous over more than a decade on what he calls the downgrade of pathology services at Whakatāne Hospital.

Anyone who has closely followed what he has been saying over the years and is capable of reading between the lines a bit, will have realised that his main problem is the fact that the hospital laboratory was privatised and services were consolidated in Tauranga.

Whilst Mr Milne and I don’t agree on everything, we absolutely share the view that further privatisation of New Zealand’s health system would be devastating for health equity.

He is acutely aware of this and uses the case of the Whakatāne Hospital Pathology Laboratory as an example of how a takeover by private entities occurs by stealth.

Today, 35 percent of Kiwis have private health insurance, and the remaining 65 percent do not. That means that our health system is, by definition, highly inequitable.

After having spent years studying and monitoring our health system, I came to the conclusion that we have been on a slippery slope for some time and are headed for crisis.

Most of the public would have become aware of the crisis in December of 2024 when obstetrics and gynecology services at Whakatāne Hospital had to be suspended from mid-January.

As I keep reiterating, O&G is but one of 41 health specialties. I would brace for more problems in other areas.

I believe that it is high time that neoliberal economists and others who have put their undying faith in the market declare failure.

The Nobel prize-winning economist, Professor Joseph Stiglitz, did so some time ago. It is clear that in health, and other critical areas, the market has not worked and will not work for most of us.

A system of health care that depends on wealth is inherently unfair.

It puts us on the path to an American-style health system that serves those with money only reasonably well and the majority poorly or not at all. This is surely not what we want in Aotearoa.

The American system costs 2.5 times what ours does on a per capita basis and has worse average outcomes. That proves that privatisation is not good (for most of us). It is not economically efficient and does not give good average outcomes. So, in that regard Mr Milne is correct.

As for “doers not divas” and needing people with ‘ideas, energy and willingness to roll up their sleeves and work – for everyone not just their mates’, it beats me how anyone could accuse Mr Milne of not rolling up his sleeves and working for everyone, even at the age of 91.

Perhaps Ms MacKenzie is unaware of the full significance of what Mr Milne achieved in the Hepatitis B area. His persistence and tenacity saved many lives. He didn’t earn an MBE for nothing. He went up against a formidable medical and health establishment and won. And he did that with dogged determination to the benefit of the people of this district.

I would strongly encourage Ms MacKenzie to read the article by extremely well-credentialed Professor William Muraskin from the City University of New York (see reference below). This academic paper is nothing less than 15 pages of unmitigated praise for Sandy Milne.

Muraskin writes ‘If the first thing you notice about Milne is his quick and perceptive mind, the second thing is his cast-iron will and sense of morality’.

I wish someone would write a paper like that about me. Given that the paper can be accessed only by subscribers, I welcome Ms McKenzie to get in touch with me and I will happily provide her an electronic version. It is well worth the read.

n Reference: Muraskin, W. Bucking the health establishment: Alexander Milne and the fight for a New Zealand hepatitis B immunization programme. Social Sci. Med. 1995, 41(2), 211-225.