Who is to blame?

 Ordinarily, the hospital’s operating room (OR) inspires the imagery and atmosphere of seriousness and silence, except for muffled orders of the robed surgeons in surgical masks. Light banters among the OR team may lighten the mood in minor operations, but no one could ever imagine a circus-like setting and free rein of shouting and jeering like hyenas in frantic Babel.

It’s also beyond imagination that the OR is crowded with spectators, much less of kibitzing observers slyly disguised in mouth muzzles. Admittedly, removing a canister of body spray from the rectum of a gay florist lodged during a bizarre anal sex, isn’t a usual surgery. It’s as bemusingly kinky as it is offensively quirky that draws the interest of just everybody.

But the lewd curiosity didn’t stop there… Some OR kibitzers naughtily took cellphone footage, then further breached the privacy owing to the patient by uploading the three-minute procedure with the YouTube. And that fired the furor in the internet like crazy, picked up faster momentum, and spread like wild fire worldwide.

And so, the patient took courage to sue the hospital and the offending OR personnel. This was aggravated by the unsigned report of the in-house probers, not naming the offending doctors and nurses, and merely hinting vague administrative sanctions.

Mere finding that three doctors and a nurse of the Vicente Sotto Memorial Medical Center (VSMMC) committed “improper acts”, without endorsing suspension, is not satisfactory to the scandalized public, much less to the victim himself. The public feels that the VSMMC ad hoc report isn’t fair and objective, but only tailored to conceal the facts which appeased no one. Instead, it angered the more almost everybody’s sensibilities.

Someone remarked that the report just dabbled in 3 in 1 gimmickry, or multiples of 4 vague and unnamed culprits: 3 doctors and 1 nurse for “improper acts; another 1 doctor and 3 nurse supervisors were issued “stern warning”; and 1 nursing clinical instructor and 3 nursing trainees being “banned” from practicing in the hospital. Its lone endorsement for “disciplining action” is directed at a student who uploaded the video on YouTube.

 Aside from not naming the culprits, the composition of the investigation team was also not spelled out, as in incognito. Reading the report in a press conference didn’t divulge the salient facts. Justifying it with ratiocination that there is a parallel investigation by the Ombudsman, or the Department of Health, or whichever entity, is not satisfactory.

What appears paradoxical is that following some sort of fame via the YouTube of the dancing inmates of the Cebu PDRC, has been overturned to infamy by the VSMMC OR blunder. It reinforces the slur of TV actress Teri Hatcher of “Desperate Housewives” teleseries over the integrity and competence of Filipino doctors.

 And any spin fencing to hide the truth is to no avail at all, and the utter lack of professional discipline and sense of responsibility stands out. All know that the OR is taboo to kibitzers, and limited only to the surgical team. The sterilized OR atmosphere and privacy of the patient undergoing surgical procedure brook no exceptions. That in essence was what was seriously breached, plus making mockery of and virtual disrespect for, the victimized patient.

It was only lately that the Dept. of Health probers named 3 surgeons and 2 nurses, obviously to allay the public outrage. Moreover, there’s weight in Monsignor Achilles Dakay’s observation that the main issue ignited the brouhaha was the gay florist’s engaging in dirty anal sex. And the victim’s motivation to sue for a P6M price denigrates his crusade for justice. Likewise, the undeniable fact is that had he not come out in the open though with covered face, the people had no way of knowing despite the YouTube posting.

*  *  *

Email: [email protected]