February 08, 2022
NHI “herd number” for Health Ministy
The chief executive of west Auckland’s Te Whānau o Waipareira says progress for Māori has been driven by urban Māori movements, not from iwi.
Waipareira and the Whānau Ora Commissioning Agency are in a fight with the Ministry of Health for data that could help with efforts to reach unvaccinated Māori.
The ministry has been slow to move, citing privacy concerns and its relationships with iwi – even though the National Health Index does not collect iwi data.
Mr Tamihere says the ministry sees the NHI number as a herd number, and it wants to keep control of the herd. Iwi leaders look at their numbers a bit like a herd as well, thinking they own us, but the vast majority of them can’t deliver one service to us. That’s because we no longer live in a tribal nirvana, even if we ever did. We now live in new communities,” he says.
Mr Tamihere says it’s time for the politicians to step up and instruct the ministry to cooperate.