Save our emergency ward

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NEARLY 300 people have signed an online petition to stop the State Government from reducing Modbury Hospital emergency department services.

Tea Tree Gully councillor Damian Wyld started the petition as part of a council campaign to stop the government’s plan.

The online petition also includes a Facebook page, which has about 560 likes.

“The petition is simply to create sufficient noise, that the State Government understands the level of community angst on this issue which stretches across all demographics,” Mr Wyld said.

“The prospect of having to go to Elizabeth or the city is quite worrying for them (residents).”

Mr Wyld spoke with the Leader Messenger about the campaign after Health Minister Jack Snelling accepted the council’s request that he front councillors to explain the government’s long-term health plan and its implications to the Modbury Hospital.

Under the government’s plan, seriously ill patients would be sent to one of the three major departments at Flinders, Royal Adelaide and Lyell McEwin.

Emergency services at Modbury, Queen Elizabeth and Noarlunga hospitals would be reduced.

Concerned Highbury resident Margaret Riley wants the council to do more to help preserve services at Modbury.

“We need to be firmer than (asking for a meeting), we need to be saying this is a waste of money,” Mrs Riley said.

“This is a resource that we need to protect … that we won’t ever get back again, and we need to be firm that we don’t want the State Government to take it away.”

Former mayor Lesley Purdom said the government had a history of attacking local services.

“Our State Government has been steadily chipping away at health services in this community, starting by transferring mental health support services from Modbury to Salisbury cut around about 10 years ago.”

Opposition Health spokesman Stephen Wade said the government’s intention was clear.

“The State Labor Government had made it clear that it is considering closing a hospital as it pursues health cuts – two-thirds of which are State Government cuts,” Mr Wade said.

“The Liberal Party does not support the closure of any public hospital in SA,” he said.

“We do not believe that any community should pay for Labor’s mismanagement with the loss of its hospital,” he said.