«I have always had a lot of respect for true political citizenship, especially when its organizations represent the need for the sacrosanct rights of citizens to be better guaranteed, and this is why I cannot help but stigmatize the attitude that borders on media stalking which, with respect to the condition of the Mental Health Center of Taurianova, continues to have the spontaneous Committee for the Defense of Healthcare in the Piana di Gioia Tauro which, without spending any words of satisfaction to comment on the news of the recruitment of 5 new doctors, calls me into question again in a controversy that I can no longer accept.” This is what Mayor Roy Biasi declared regarding the position taken by the spokesperson of the association created to defend the Polistena hospital, commenting on the news released on social channels by the mayor of Tauriano who in recent days announced the contractualization of professionals who will strengthen the Psychiatric Services of the area.
«I am used to not asking for discounts when it comes to well-founded criticism – continues Biasi – but frankly it seems ungenerous to me to be attacked even after my communication had put an end to a controversy in which I had not been spared venomous barbs during a sit in which also gave space to inadmissible outbursts from those who perhaps were thinking of starting the election campaign for the spring municipal elections early. And if yesterday I was reproached for having been during the hours of the protest where a mayor must be, not in the square but in the Town Hall to continue working for the good of my community, urging the concrete results that the ASP then brought, today I am blamed for having defined decisive measures which to the president of the Committee seem stopgap. I have remained silent so far to avoid controversies that could distract from the objective, or discourage the professionals who were then hired who could complain about the artfully overheated climate in what was to become their workplace, but today, although not entering into the merits of the political strategy of the protesters, if not to say that the president Roberto Occhiuto and the deputy Francesco Cannizzaro, like the general director of the ASP Lucia Di Furia and the sector manager Anna Bagalà, should only be thanked for their attention who also assured in the case of the upcoming retirement of the CSM doctors, I repeat that it is not by fueling exasperation and instilling concerns that do not exist that the problems of staff shortages which are now widespread throughout Italy will not be resolved”.
«Therefore, it remains wonderful news – according to the mayor – that the solution to improve the Taurianoese structure has been identified and, rather, it seems to me that what was triggered by the Committee’s words is a new attempt to throw it into confusion, to create new confusion, to unnecessarily raise the stakes as if a hidden and interested direction, perhaps the result of dynamics that have nothing to do with the fair rights of citizens, to prime and hypothesize other forms of protest. I therefore invite those who are in good faith to distance themselves from this campaign of political hatred against those who have made appropriate and decisive decisions. I turn first of all to the families of the patients and to that part of the Committee which does not pursue aims of political annihilation but believes, like me, that the best way to bring home the results is through dialogue and realism: given that the CSM is not closing, as I had assured from the first moment in the face of the artfully created alarmism, we can look at it with renewed trust in institutions by moving away from those who love to cry wolf. To those who have instead attempted to ride the wave of indignation, for local electoral purposes, I say to give up since the maintenance of the CSM of Taurianova is only the last concrete result that this Municipal Administration has obtained in the healthcare field, a full-bodied advance of other innovations for old and new services that I will be able to announce shortly. As we can see, therefore, the politics of actions, preferable to words, which we do not want to give up, continues to pay, especially in this new political season opened by President Roberto Occhiuto and the Hon. Francesco Cannizzaro, who continue to hold the city of Taurianova in renewed consideration, as part of a strategy that sees the Municipality enjoying the right collaborations, with the Region and beyond, to further enhance the leap forward that the city has made in recent years and ensure new opportunities that improve the lives of the people of Taurianova, or, as in the case of the CSM of Taurianova, providing both Occhiuto and Cannizzaro with a personal and decisive contribution for the defense and relaunch of a structure which satisfies a demand for services that comes from the entire Piana area.”