Report: Hospital's heroin production profit never made public

The millions of euros of profit Slotervaart hospital made with the production of heroin, was only ever reported in a secret annual report. And not a matter of publicly available information, as Minister Edith Schippers of Public Health led Parliament to believe, NRC reports based on its own research. At least twice Minister Schippers told the Tweede Kamer, the lower house of Dutch parliament, that the controversial profits were stated in the hospital's annual report. But according to NRC, this was not the case. The heroin profits were only ever stated in a secret annual report, only available to the hospital and the Public Health Ministry. A spokesperson for Schippers acknowledged that the minister referred to "a document" containing "more information" than the public annual report when answering parliamentary questions. Schippers based her answers on an annual report prepared "for internal use and for interested third parties, such as the Ministry in its role as order giver". CDA parliamentarian Hanke Bruins called Schippers' answers "sloppy". "Why did the minisster refer to a report which is not public?" she said to NRC, adding that the CDA wants to see the secret version of the report as quickly as possible. The SP wants answers from Schippers on this matter before the end of the week. "Schippers dist the Kamer with the suggestion that the report is public. In this way she twice trivialized the fact that the payment of a portion of the million profit on heroin was concealed." Renske Leijten said to the news agency.