On Monday Cardiologist John Gough and Gastroenterologist Ervin Gabourel will go to Corozal Magistrate's court to be arraigned for disorderly conduct. That's a fairly minor offence that resulted from the border brawl the par got into at the Santa Elena crossing on Tuesday.
But will they also be made to face disciplinary charges from the Medical Council? According to the Belize's Medical Practitioners' Registration Act, that Council is the body legally authorized to sanction doctors for misconduct or malpractice.
As we reported the chair of the council is presently Dr. George Gough, the brother of Dr. John Gough. He has been unavailable for comment, so it is left to be seen if the six member council will bring charges against either of the doctors involved in the fisticuffs.
If Dr. George chooses to recuse himself from such deliberation, we note that the law does not make provision for any vice-chairman to be appointed, so it is unclear who would take the lead.
But it should come to the council's for consideration because according to the law professional misconduct includes "any conduct which is likely to bring the profession into disrepute." We don't know what qualifies as "disrepute" but every doctor we've spoken to told us they're deeply embarrassed by what happened.
And the council does not need a formal complaint, because it can act on issues that come to its notice. But the precedent shows that in the past when matters involving doctors have gone to court, the council has reserved its deliberations until after the court matter was settled to avoid any suggestion of prejudicing matters before the court.
