4 ms·

Just for additional note: * the owner of the lab that realized the tests (PCS Lab Saleme) is the cousin of the former secretary of health from Rio, Dr.Luizinh

Just for additional note: * the owner of the lab that realized the tests (PCS Lab Saleme) is the cousin of the former secretary of health from Rio, Dr.Luizinho. * Anvisa (brazil health regulatory agency) alleges the lab didn't have the kits to realize the blood exams and didn't present the receipts proving their purchases, leading to the suspicion they didn't do the tests at all and forged the results. * Since many hospitals outsourced donor organ tests to the 3rd party lab, there is a precedent for more cases of infected organs, so the stored material of 286 donors will be retested by HemoRio, a state health unity.

Qem 2y ago
[flagged]
- appendix-rock 2y ago
  No. That is just naive pattern-matching against a hot-button issue that you read a lot about on HN. For both this story AND Boeing, the explanation is more complicated than “outsourcing bad!”
  - iancmceachern 2y ago
    Yeah, it's more about the failure of the checks and balances in both cases. Old school corruption really.
  - zmgsabst 2y ago
    Okay — what makes it more complicated?
    - lukan 2y ago
      Because you can have solid outsourced work, as long as you bother to check and verify that work.
      - zmgsabst 2y ago
        I haven’t seen a company outsource a core competency and succeed, eg Boeing outsourcing airplane manufacturing.
        krisoft 2y ago
        How about Apple and Foxconn? If your reaction is that Apple’s core competency is in marketing and design and not manufacturing then i will ask if the same pattern couldn’t be applied to Boeing.
        zmgsabst 2y ago
        Apple is higher up the descent than Boeing — but I’d argue that their lackluster iPhone 16 is precisely that they’re on the same slope.
      - raziel2701 2y ago
        In this particular case you're saying you need to test the organs once at the outsource place and then again at the hospital? Why not just get rid of outsourcing then?
        Bouncingsoul1 2y ago
        No, that is not what the parent said. "Check an verfiy" can come in diffrent forms and tastes eg. having some samples (not all) checked by another lab, asking for standards and inspection performed by 3rd parties, asking and checking for documentation...the hell how do you think anybody could work with suppliers?
        krisoft 2y ago
        > eg. having some samples (not all) checked by another lab, I don't think that is useful at all in case of rare diseases. You would just get two reports saying that the random sample is free of HIV. Much better would be to send some known control samples. Making sure that some of the samples is known HIV+, and then check if the supplier can tell which ones are those.
    - braza 2y ago
      Further context: In Brazil since we have universal health care provided by the government, generally speaking non outsourced or contractors becomes public servants. The issue is: Public service in Brazil is expensive and is virtually impossible to fire anyone. On top of that the cost of public service has second order effects in the public balance sheet for the municipalities plus it has a huge burden in the public retirement system. Not saying that is right or wrong, but this is very common in the Brazilian heath system.
  - Teever 2y ago
    It's also an example of the really irksome thing that happens on American sites where people will quickly steer the conversation away from non-America stuff to America stuff because they feel more comfortable talking about something that they know about than just not participating in the conversation and watching other people talk about stuff that they are knowledgeable of. Which is kinda silly because if they just sat back and listened they could learn more about the thing that other people are talking about so that the next time this topic comes up they won't feel uncomfortable and can jump in and add something to the conversation instead of just nervously pivoting to talking about Alatucky or Boeing or the number of street poops in SF. I for one look forward to learning more about the medical system of Brazil from this post.
    - MichaelZuo 2y ago
      It is noticeable but this seems a bit circular though. If the user-base is predominantly American then of course if you tally up the random nonsense comments on any given day, they will also be predominantly made by Americans, due to probability.
- photochemsyn 2y ago
  Nothing wrong with outsourcing as long as it doesn't allow the user of the third-party operation to escape legal liability for failures and fraud committed by said third party that affect the user's clients.
- JoshTko 2y ago
  Outsourcing isn't a problem, people don't make their own clothes. It's inadequate checks relative to the risk of the component.
  - raziel2701 2y ago
    How are you gonna check the organs? You can't see HIV on the organs by eye. Checking means re-testing, so might as well get rid of outsourcing.
    - krisoft 2y ago
      > How are you gonna check the organs? You don’t check the organs. You check the process by intermingling known HIV+ samples and check if they are being detected. > Checking means re-testing, so might as well get rid of outsourcing. Thing is you need to do QA on the testing system no matter what. Doesn’t matter if it is performed by contractors, in house staff or little grey aliens. If you are not doing QA you won’t know if the testing is done correctly or not.
  - Terr_ 2y ago
    > It's inadequate checks I agree provided that "checks" isn't just the narrow sense of "verification upon receipt of the product", but also the supporting framework of "violators will get punished."
  - unwise-exe 2y ago
    In-house workers can phone it in as well. At some point, your recursive watchers of watchers watching watchers has to have a base case of "we trust this entity" (or maybe, "you, the public, trust this entity"). Outsourcing only matters for this if it provides a break in the chain of responsibility. That is, if the person selecting the outsource provider can (successfully) say "hey, not my fault" by pointing to... some entity that whoever they answer to doesn't already trust.
rbanffy 2y ago
> Dr.Luizinho. He was also short listed to take over the Ministry of Health under Bolsonaro’s government.

Qem 2y ago

[flagged]

appendix-rock 2y ago
No. That is just naive pattern-matching against a hot-button issue that you read a lot about on HN. For both this story AND Boeing, the explanation is more complicated than “outsourcing bad!”
- iancmceachern 2y ago
  Yeah, it's more about the failure of the checks and balances in both cases. Old school corruption really.
- zmgsabst 2y ago
  Okay — what makes it more complicated?
  - lukan 2y ago
    Because you can have solid outsourced work, as long as you bother to check and verify that work.
    - zmgsabst 2y ago
      I haven’t seen a company outsource a core competency and succeed, eg Boeing outsourcing airplane manufacturing.
      - krisoft 2y ago
        How about Apple and Foxconn? If your reaction is that Apple’s core competency is in marketing and design and not manufacturing then i will ask if the same pattern couldn’t be applied to Boeing.
        zmgsabst 2y ago
        Apple is higher up the descent than Boeing — but I’d argue that their lackluster iPhone 16 is precisely that they’re on the same slope.
    - raziel2701 2y ago
      In this particular case you're saying you need to test the organs once at the outsource place and then again at the hospital? Why not just get rid of outsourcing then?
      - Bouncingsoul1 2y ago
        No, that is not what the parent said. "Check an verfiy" can come in diffrent forms and tastes eg. having some samples (not all) checked by another lab, asking for standards and inspection performed by 3rd parties, asking and checking for documentation...the hell how do you think anybody could work with suppliers?
        krisoft 2y ago
        > eg. having some samples (not all) checked by another lab, I don't think that is useful at all in case of rare diseases. You would just get two reports saying that the random sample is free of HIV. Much better would be to send some known control samples. Making sure that some of the samples is known HIV+, and then check if the supplier can tell which ones are those.
  - braza 2y ago
    Further context: In Brazil since we have universal health care provided by the government, generally speaking non outsourced or contractors becomes public servants. The issue is: Public service in Brazil is expensive and is virtually impossible to fire anyone. On top of that the cost of public service has second order effects in the public balance sheet for the municipalities plus it has a huge burden in the public retirement system. Not saying that is right or wrong, but this is very common in the Brazilian heath system.
- Teever 2y ago
  It's also an example of the really irksome thing that happens on American sites where people will quickly steer the conversation away from non-America stuff to America stuff because they feel more comfortable talking about something that they know about than just not participating in the conversation and watching other people talk about stuff that they are knowledgeable of. Which is kinda silly because if they just sat back and listened they could learn more about the thing that other people are talking about so that the next time this topic comes up they won't feel uncomfortable and can jump in and add something to the conversation instead of just nervously pivoting to talking about Alatucky or Boeing or the number of street poops in SF. I for one look forward to learning more about the medical system of Brazil from this post.
  - MichaelZuo 2y ago
    It is noticeable but this seems a bit circular though. If the user-base is predominantly American then of course if you tally up the random nonsense comments on any given day, they will also be predominantly made by Americans, due to probability.
photochemsyn 2y ago
Nothing wrong with outsourcing as long as it doesn't allow the user of the third-party operation to escape legal liability for failures and fraud committed by said third party that affect the user's clients.
JoshTko 2y ago
Outsourcing isn't a problem, people don't make their own clothes. It's inadequate checks relative to the risk of the component.
- raziel2701 2y ago
  How are you gonna check the organs? You can't see HIV on the organs by eye. Checking means re-testing, so might as well get rid of outsourcing.
  - krisoft 2y ago
    > How are you gonna check the organs? You don’t check the organs. You check the process by intermingling known HIV+ samples and check if they are being detected. > Checking means re-testing, so might as well get rid of outsourcing. Thing is you need to do QA on the testing system no matter what. Doesn’t matter if it is performed by contractors, in house staff or little grey aliens. If you are not doing QA you won’t know if the testing is done correctly or not.
- Terr_ 2y ago
  > It's inadequate checks I agree provided that "checks" isn't just the narrow sense of "verification upon receipt of the product", but also the supporting framework of "violators will get punished."
- unwise-exe 2y ago
  In-house workers can phone it in as well. At some point, your recursive watchers of watchers watching watchers has to have a base case of "we trust this entity" (or maybe, "you, the public, trust this entity"). Outsourcing only matters for this if it provides a break in the chain of responsibility. That is, if the person selecting the outsource provider can (successfully) say "hey, not my fault" by pointing to... some entity that whoever they answer to doesn't already trust.

rbanffy 2y ago

> Dr.Luizinho. He was also short listed to take over the Ministry of Health under Bolsonaro’s government.