Tamar Watson
...recuperating at hospital.

“The hospital system is failing Tamar miserably.” These were the words of irate boxing promoter Buxo Potts yesterday. Tamar Watson is recuperating at the Port-of-Spain General Hospital, after an accident in which she sustained two broken legs and a broken collar bone and the loss of her friend, boxing icon Jizelle Salandy, on December 4. Potts said Watson had not been getting painkillers, toiletries, proper medical attention and the hospital had not briefed her mother Valerina Watson on her daughter’s medical condition. “The hospital system is failing her miserably,” Potts said. The hospital does not even have painkillers for her...We had to go and get some for her. “She is tellng them the painkillers are not working, and she has been roughed up on the ward. They don’t have toiletries...They don’t have toilet paper.”

To compound the situation, Potts said, the hospital authorities had a “big hush hush.” “They have not yet put her mother to sit down and say if something might be wrong with Tamar’s spine, her back... wherever,” he said. “We have to get some kind of information so we can know how to move.” Potts said the country owed it to Watson to treat her with dignity and respect. “Give her the same treatment you would have given Jizelle,” he said. He said everybody who had come to visit Watson was put out of the ward.

Appeal to Narace

Potts said he was appealing to Health Minister Jerry Narace to mobilise his staff to take proper care of Watson. “I am calling on Jerry Narace to act on the situation,” he said. “If it doesn’t happen, I will mobilise the whole country against him.” When contacted at 1.15 pm yesterday, Narace said to contact the chairman of the North West Regional Health Authority.

Kudos for Jack Warner

In Tamar’s time of distress, Potts said, Chaguanas West MP Jack Warner came to her assistance by purchasing a wheelchair for her. “Warner bought a wheelchair for Watson and put his credit card in the room,” he said. “She does not need it right now...He put his credit card in the room.”