Governor orders review of oversight of abortion clinic
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Less than two days after he was sworn in, Gov. Tom Corbett tasked his secretary of health and commonwealth nominees with finding out "where the breakdowns were" that permitted a West Philadelphia doctor now charged with murdering newborns to operate an abortion clinic described in a grand jury report as a "house of horrors."
Spokesman Kevin Harley said Mr. Corbett read the report Wednesday evening and held a meeting Thursday morning in which he directed Eli Avila, nominee for the secretary of health, and Carol Aichele, nominee for secretary of the commonwealth, "to use the grand jury report ... to conduct a complete review of each of the agencies to figure out what went wrong," Mr. Harley said.
He expects both to produce recommendations within the week, which could entail changes in personnel or policy, though he has not set a firm deadline for reports, Mr. Harley said.
Both Mr. Avila, the former deputy commissioner of the Suffolk County Department of Health Services, and Ms. Aichele, a Chester County commissioner, started their jobs last week and are still awaiting Senate confirmation. Mr. Harley would not make either available for comment.
The doctor, Kermit Gosnell, was arraigned Thursday on eight charges of homicide for killing seven newborns and one female patient. A grand jury report released Wednesday detailed how Dr. Gosnell ran an unsanitary clinic in which newborns with signs of life were killed with scissors after botched abortions. Nine other employees of the clinic were also charged. In addition to the woman who died, scores suffered complications from shoddily performed abortions.
The report delivered stinging criticism of the agencies charged with overseeing abortion clinics, saying that Dr. Gosnell operated on the state's radar for decades and that officials failed to act on complaints against him. A former state health department employee, Janice Staloski, told the grand jury that she should have ordered an investigation into the Philadelphia clinic after repeated complaints. The department of state oversees licensing of doctors and never took action on Dr. Gosnell's license.
First Published January 23, 2011 12:00 am
