Former Health Min. Kuipers blasts child cardiologist center leaders

In an interview with the NRC, former Health Minister Ernst Kuipers lashed out at the directors of the children's heart centers, who were able to reverse his decision to centralize this specialist care. According to him, they are only interested in their own money and status and not in the patients. They should be "ashamed of themselves", he told the newspaper.

Kuipers had decided to limit the five university hospitals that currently offer pediatric heart surgery to Rotterdam and Groningen. This would secure the expertise. However, the centers in Utrecht and Amsterdam/Leiden would lose this specialized care and therefore went to court. The judge overturned the decision as it was not well-founded.

"That makes me smirk. In healthcare, it's quite simple: the more often you carry out treatment, the better the doctors and nurses become. And then you can perform a pediatric heart operation, which is very complex, in five places in the country in small numbers?" said Kuipers, who still believes that concentration is needed.

He points out that the healthcare sector has been struggling with this problem for 30 years. "First people were happy that there was a minister who dared to make a decision, then they went to court anyway. And who has to bear the pain now? Not me, a minister is a passer-by. But the patients are. All the directors of these centers should be ashamed of themselves. They know very well that their plea is about their own money and status and not about the interests of the patients."

Kuipers' successor Pia Dijkstra also disagreed with the judge but decided not to appeal. She believes that all parties involved should return to the table to strive for some form of concentration.

The former minister also looks back on his sudden departure. This had been necessary to apply for foreign offers. He did not want to comment on this at the time because the process was still ongoing. However, it is certain that Kuipers will work at a university in Singapore.