OCHO RIOS, St Ann — At a regular sitting of the St Ann Municipal Corporation held Thursday, People’s National Party Councillor Ian Bell, who represents the Beecher Town Division, delivered a pointed rebuke of St Ann’s top health official, calling out Chief Medical Officer Dr. Tamika Henry’s prolonged absence from the body’s monthly general council sessions.
Bell stressed that local municipal representatives have been denied critical access to the region’s top public health leader for a full 24 months, noting that Henry has only sent formal apologies for her non-attendance month after month without resuming in-person or virtual participation. “We deserve direct answers from the chief medical officer about the ongoing state of public health in St Ann, and we have a right to know why she has refused to join these meetings for two full years,” Bell told fellow council members. “This broken pattern of non-attendance is simply unacceptable and cannot continue.”
The criticism comes at an odd moment: just recently, Dr. Henry and her twin sister Dr. Tamara Henry-Gilpin, who serves as Chief Medical Officer for neighboring St Mary, were profiled by local St Ann publication *North Coast Times* for their decades of combined service in the medical sector and their reputed commitment to advancing local health care across both parishes.
This public celebration of Henry’s work only deepened Bell’s skepticism around her commitment to municipal transparency, he said. “If she is truly as dedicated to her role as the profile claims, she should honor the requirement to attend these local board of health meetings and engage directly with elected representatives,” Bell argued. He added that the current workaround of having Chief Public Health Officer Delroy Scott stand in to deliver presentations on Henry’s behalf is functionally ineffective.
“Multiple times, council members have posed pressing public health questions to Mr. Scott, but he does not hold the authority or the inside information to answer them — and we cannot fault him for that gap,” Bell explained. “I’ve watched council meetings from other parishes across Jamaica, and every single other region has their chief medical officer present to report directly to representatives. St Ann is the only outlier here.”
Scott, who was in attendance at Thursday’s meeting, acknowledged the criticism and addressed Bell’s concerns directly. He confirmed that scheduling conflicts are the primary barrier that has kept Henry from attending sessions, and committed to relaying the council’s frustrations to the CMO after the meeting.