LOCAL boxing promoter, Boxu Potts, is disgusted by the lack of concern shown to Tamar Watson in her time of need.
Potts claimed Watson was being "roughed-up" by the nurses on the ward at the Port of Spain General Hospital.
"These nurses fail to realise that they are people too and they have family too. What they don't want for themselves they shouldn't give to someone else," Potts said.
He added that if the attitude of the nurses was the only problem, he could deal with it, but he learned that things were much worse: the hospital had no pain medication. As a result of this, Watson had not been given any pain medication for over eight hours. Potts said he eventually had to purchase the medication for her because Watson's mother, Valerine Watson, could not afford to.
Potts said he was disgusted by the lack of concern shown by the Government at Watson's time of need.
"The hospital has no pain medication?" he asked during a telephone interview yesterday.
Potts argued that with all the money in the Government coffers, it was disgusting that people cannot get proper treatment,
"I am furious with the level of treatment at that hospital. Imagine I have to get a prescription and get it filled at a pharmacy because the hospital have no drugs?"
He added, "Nobody knows the real situation right now."
He explained that the Government paid for the senior Watson to stay at a hotel close to the hospital, but they only allotted her one week. That week was up yesterday and Watson was forced to seek other accommodation.
"The mother lives in Siparia. How is she to get back and forth for visiting hours?" Potts asked.
He said Watson was in dire need of assistance with simple things like top-up cards for her mobile phone.
"The woman cannot afford to buy a card and no one stepping forward to help. As soon as the camera lights off, everybody forget there is still a life here to save."
In his quest to assist, Potts turned to the one person he could think to help.
"I called Jack Warner and he was able to set up a credit account to ease some of the worries. Her mother is so distraught, she not even answering calls anymore. I fielding everything now. If anybody need anything to do with Watson, call me!"
Hospital horrors for Tamar
By Michelle Loubon (T&T Guardian)
“The hospital system is failing Tamar miserably.” These were the words of irate boxing promoter Buxo Potts yesterday. Tamar Watson is recuperating at the Port-of-Spain General Hospital, after an accident in which she sustained two broken legs and a broken collar bone and the loss of her friend, boxing icon Jizelle Salandy, on December 4. Potts said Watson had not been getting painkillers, toiletries, proper medical attention and the hospital had not briefed her mother Valerina Watson on her daughter’s medical condition. “The hospital system is failing her miserably,” Potts said. The hospital does not even have painkillers for her...We had to go and get some for her. “She is tellng them the painkillers are not working, and she has been roughed up on the ward. They don’t have toiletries...They don’t have toilet paper.”
To compound the situation, Potts said, the hospital authorities had a “big hush hush.” “They have not yet put her mother to sit down and say if something might be wrong with Tamar’s spine, her back... wherever,” he said. “We have to get some kind of information so we can know how to move.” Potts said the country owed it to Watson to treat her with dignity and respect. “Give her the same treatment you would have given Jizelle,” he said. He said everybody who had come to visit Watson was put out of the ward.
Appeal to Narace
Potts said he was appealing to Health Minister Jerry Narace to mobilise his staff to take proper care of Watson. “I am calling on Jerry Narace to act on the situation,” he said. “If it doesn’t happen, I will mobilise the whole country against him.” When contacted at 1.15 pm yesterday, Narace said to contact the chairman of the North West Regional Health Authority.
Kudos for Jack Warner
In Tamar’s time of distress, Potts said, Chaguanas West MP Jack Warner came to her assistance by purchasing a wheelchair for her. “Warner bought a wheelchair for Watson and put his credit card in the room,” he said. “She does not need it right now...He put his credit card in the room.”