EDITORIAL - The toilet paper debate

Dr Winston Davidson, the chairman of the board of the Bureau of Standards Jamaica (BSJ), talks loudly and enunciates clearly. But with respect to the toilet paper issue, we can't say the same for his logic.

He seems conflicted over what should take precedence: the protection of the public interest and people's health, or shielding the Government from lawsuits which could result from action in support of the former. He chose to fear the lawsuit.

We, of course, disagree.

We, nonetheless, say this much for Dr Davidson: he has put his views out there, ready to argue in their defence - as wrong as we perceive them to be.

In contrast, the health minister, Dr Fenton Ferguson, is missing from the debate, failing to take charge of what, Davidson's arguments notwithstanding, is a pressing public-health matter. Dr Ferguson is probably busy designing his children's hospital for western Jamaica and the oncology centres of excellence he promised Jamaica.

AN IMPORTANT OMISSION

Several weeks ago, this newspaper highlighted the toilet paper issue, reporting that several - mostly imported - brands on the market had high microbial content and that women were turning up at their doctors with seemingly related gynaecological complaints.

The BSJ has apparently corroborated the importance of those concerns and, with the support of public-health officials, has begun pulling the offending tissues from the shelves. It has even published a list - the completeness of which we are not sure - of supposedly safe brands.

What the BSJ and the public-health authorities have failed to do is give the public the information that is easiest used and, therefore, of greatest value to them: the brands of toilet tissue they should avoid. The assumption here is that in an open market with scores of brands of toilet paper, the public, by a process of matching and elimination, will eventually determine the bad ones.

Dr Davidson's argument for this approach is that the BSJ has no declared standards for toilet tissue and that naming the offending brands would be to make the agency susceptible to legal claims, which taxpayers would have to pay if the claimants won.

PUBLIC HEALTH COMES FIRST

Further, there is no clear cause-effect relationship between the compromised toilet paper brands and the health problems that have arisen so far. In any event, the toilet paper danger is minuscule.

Our response is that Dr Davidson should allow the lawyers to quibble over the legal issues. His primary responsibility, in his two positions, is the protection of Jamaican consumers and the public health of the country. One case of infection from a sub-par product is one too many. We prefer to risk a lawsuit than the public's health.

Even if the BSJ feels itself, as Dr Davidson argues, without authority to be more forceful in this matter, we feel that Dr Ferguson is not without leverage if he decides on the creative use of Section 16 (1) of the Public Health Act, which allows the minister, in the event of the "existence of any local condition ... tending to endanger public health, and there are no powers under any law other than this section whereby such condition may be removed or guarded against", to direct the enforcement of any measures recommended by the Central Health Committee or by a Local Board, as the case may be, or any other measures that he think expedient".

The opinions on this page, except for the above, do not necessarily reflect the views of The Gleaner. To respond to a Gleaner editorial, email us: editor@gleanerjm.com or fax: 922-6223. Responses should be no longer than 400 words. Not all responses will be published.