“the neonatal unit of SS Annunziata is at risk of closure”

The Forza Italia group in the Puglia regional council has presented a request for an urgent hearing to clarify the potential closure of the neonatal department in Taranto. “A very serious situation – says the regional councilor Massimiliano Di Cuia – reported today by a doctor on duty in the Neonatology department of the “Santissima Annunziata” hospital in Taranto, which risks closing shortly due to a lack of doctors. For this reason, I will file in the next few hours a request for
urgent hearing in the Health commission of the regional councilor, the head of department and the general director of the Local Health Authority of Taranto. Fourteen doctors are expected on paper for the department in question, but currently there are only seven and in a few weeks the number will drop to three, thus forcing it to close its doors with unacceptable consequences. If the intensive unit were condemned to closure, newborns with pathologies would have to be transferred to Bari, Lecce or Foggia and it is clear that these would be extremely delicate transfers. A critical situation that repeats itself cyclically and on which I announce right now that I will not give in an inch and will explore every useful avenue to achieve the goal of increasing the number of doctors in the department”.