Opinion | Don't let hospital drama undermine our faith in system

What is the most valuable thing in life? Good health of course. So providing high-quality, professional public health services to citizens is what people legitimately expect from any government.

But how can we achieve this? It all rests on having a good team of medical staff who have their hearts in their job and a high standard of professional ethics.

Hong Kong has long enjoyed a reputation of having a high standard of public health care. But when Health Secretary Ko Wing-man returned from his summer break a week ago, he found himself facing a big challenge which, if not handled properly, could likely weaken the public's trust in our efficient system. It is a Hong Kong version of The Great White Tower saga.

The Great White Tower, a Japanese TV series based on novelist Yamazaki Toyoko's work of the same name, has been used as a reference to politics within the medical field. The novel tells of how a university hospital in Japan became embroiled in political infighting through its handling of medical blunders, but conscience and ethics eventually prevailed. The show rated well when it was aired in Hong Kong years ago.

What the public did not expect was to see was a real-life version of White Tower played out over the past two weeks. We do not know the ending yet as an investigation by an independent committee set up by the Hospital Authority under Ko's bureau is still under way.

It all started when it was revealed that Dr Yu Cheuk-man, a renowned cardiologist in Chinese University's medical school and also head of the cardiology unit at Prince of Wales Hospital, had been banned from conducting any heart procudures, due to perceived misconduct and complaints from patients and other doctors. Yu, who disagreed with the ban, fought back by holding press conferences, claiming that he was a victim of a political struggle.