Fifteen doctors from the Virtual Rural Generalist Service have called for executives involved in the ban to be sacked and referred to ICAC and the HCCC.
Fifteen doctors in Orange, NSW have called for the dismissal of health executives who decided to restrict access to abortion services at the local hospital in 2024.
In November it was revealed that the management of Orange Hospital, a public facility operated by NSW Health, had ordered its staff to stop providing abortions for patients with “no identified pregnancy complications”.
On 8 November, Western NSW Local Health District walked that back, saying services would be restored.
“The WNSWLHD Executive has assessed immediate matters at Orange Hospital, and the level of abortion services which has historically been provided at the facility will be restored and available to the community,” said the statement.
“In line with the next steps NSW Health is taking to enhance access to safe abortion care, WNSWLHD is also undertaking a separate assessment and review of access to services across public facilities in Western NSW.
“This review commenced recently and is a separate consideration to matters specific to Orange Hospital and has not yet developed any recommendations.”
That review has been conducted, according to a statement from WNSWLHD, with no “serious maladministration” found.
“The review, commissioned in November 2024, considered a range of issues, including whether the decision to change the level of service delivery, and the circumstances which led to it, would constitute ‘serious maladministration’ as defined by the NSW Public Interest Disclosures Act,” said the WNSWLHD spokesperson.
“The review is complete and found there was no breach of the Act.”
The ABC reported today that, later in November, 15 doctors from across the country wrote to the chair of WNSWLHD, Matthew Irvine, calling the ban “a slap in the face to rural women”. It is believed the letter was not sent until late in December and was submitted to the Independent Commission against Corruption and the Health Care Complaints Commission.
They also called for any executives involved in the decision to be sacked and referred to AHPRA or the Public Service Commissioner.
The 15 signatories to the letter belong to the Virtual Rural Generalist Service, which was set up by NSW Health to provide support to emergency departments in the Western NSW LHD. It is not clear whether any of the doctors work for Orange Health Service.
“As healthcare providers working [with] the WNSWLHD we are both heartbroken and incensed by these reports,” the letter reads.
“The allegations that health executives at Orange Health Service individually implicated themselves in restricting abortion services are shocking and unacceptable … intervention to restrict legal health care at this level is a clear violation of the employee code of conduct.
“Rural women already face significant barriers to accessing abortion care in NSW, and the fact that a rural hospital such as Orange Health Service is participating in further restriction of services is a slap in the face to all rural women living in the LHD.”
A separate district-wide assessment of public abortion care services has also been completed, and the LHD said abortion care guidelines had been updated and were under internal consultation.
The LHD’s spokesperson said the guidelines would be “finalised and implemented in the coming weeks, ensuring the responsibilities of facilities providing abortion care are clear and concise”.
They said a “working party” of managers, obstetricians, gynaecologists, nurses, midwives, community health and social workers has also been set up to further develop referral pathways so that women have access to timely, appropriate abortion care.