The PSOE of Lanzarote has "resoundingly denied" the accusations by Coalición Canaria about the future of the Insular Hospital and has made it clear that "never, at any time, has the Socialist Party proposed the disappearance of the Insular Hospital or the elimination of its geriatric model".
The general secretary of the PSOE of Lanzarote, María Dolores Corujo, has accused Coalición Canaria of "deliberately lying" to "divert attention from the real debate": what the Government of the Canary Islands and the Cabildo of Lanzarote are going to do with the Insular Hospital.
In this regard, the former manager of the Lanzarote Health Area, José Luis Aparicio, has clarified that the Functional Plan proposed by his Management to Care Programs contemplated a hospital structure with three hospitalization units and a palliative care unit, with a total capacity of between 102 and 118 beds.
“The Functional Plan proposed by the Management did not eliminate the Insular Hospital or empty its care function. Quite the contrary: it contemplated 32-40 beds for the Acute Unit, 32-40 beds for Medium Stay, 30 beds for Long Stay, and 8 beds for Palliative Care,” explained Aparicio.
The former manager has stressed that “those data, which are objective and consultable since the Functional Plan is public, contradict the narrative of Coalición Canaria on their own”. “It is false that the disappearance of the Insular Hospital was proposed. Quite the contrary, we commissioned a technical planning document, with an expansion of the number of beds, units, and future care capacity,” he added.
“The approach was precisely to guarantee sufficient capacity and plan the Insular Hospital with a future vision. Spaces and beds were foreseen to respond to the present and future needs of Lanzarote. That is planning, not closure,” he explained.
Regarding the Annexed Residence, Aparicio has clarified that "it was not part of the Functional Plan because its exit from the scope of the Insular Hospital was already foreseen in the seventh provision of Annex III of the integration agreement, signed by Pedro San Ginés, as president of the Cabildo of Lanzarote, and José Manuel Baltar, as Minister of Health of the Government of the Canary Islands".
“The Annexed Residence is not in the Functional Plan because San Ginés and Baltar had already foreseen its departure from the Insular Hospital. They gave themselves a deadline to launch the new sociosanitary center in Teguise and transfer those places there, precisely to continue attending to those people in a new and adequate resource,” he pointed out.
Aparicio recalled that "the provision included in the agreement was that, once the Teguise residential center became operational, the places in the Annexed Residence would move to that new resource, freeing up that space within the Insular Hospital."
“Therefore, on this aspect too, it is important to clarify the facts. The departure of the Annexed Residence from the Insular Hospital was not a proposal introduced by the PSOE, but a provision that was already included in the agreement signed by Coalición Canaria before the socialist era,” he added.
Aparicio added, moreover, that Coalición Canaria is disseminating an image that, in his opinion, "does not reflect the entirety of the project, but only a partial schematic of the internal and external circulations of the projected building."
“That image corresponds only to the ground floor. The complete building foreseen in the Functional Plan included the ground floor, first floor, and second floor. Therefore, using a partial plan as if it represented the entirety of the Insular Hospital can lead to a mistaken interpretation of the project and generate confusion among the citizens,” he pointed out.
From the PSOE they recall that "social concern is increased by the statements of the president of the Canary Islands, Fernando Clavijo, himself, when proposing a 'different' Insular Hospital, without clearly guaranteeing the continuity of its current geriatric model."
The PSOE of Lanzarote has reiterated that "it will continue to defend the continuity of the Insular Hospital, its integral reform, and the maintenance of its geriatric and care model." “They can lie, they can manipulate technical documents, and they can try to divert the debate, but they will not cover up the main issue: Lanzarote wants to know if Coalición Canaria will maintain the Insular Hospital as a geriatric hospital. That is the answer they continue to not give,” concluded Corujo.