I’ve been watching the Danny Williams health-care saga with a bit of consternation. And I’ve been thinking about how this controversy started and has continued to swirl when the energy of Newfoundland’s premier should be focused on treatment and healing.

Two provisos first off for this discussion:

• I don’t much care whether he went to the States or not or why
• I don’t much care whether he’s paying for his health care out of pocket

The problem here has been and is one of communication.

The story about Williams broke on Newfoundland CTV affiliate NTV on Monday, February 1. Good on them for breaking a big story. Other media quickly followed, but it wasn’t until Tuesday morning that Deputy Premier Kathy Dunderdale laid out some of the facts in a news conference.

The facts revealed then included:

• There had been weeks of consultations
• The “option” of surgery in Canada was not “on the table”

The facts that weren’t included? Lots:

• The nature of the procedure
• The date when the procedure would be performed
• Where the procedure would be performed
• Who would perform it
• How long the expected recovery would be (beyond an estimate of 3-12 weeks)

There’s not even a news release on the Newfoundland and Labrador government’s media room with information available — just a media advisory (dated 8:25 on February 2) announcing the news conference by Deputy Premier Dunderdale which took place 65 minutes later.

While Williams, like anyone else, is entitled to privacy, there’s a problem here, and that problem is in the strategy. Not saying anything has given this story a huge energy boost. There’s nothing more attractive to journalists than a secret, and this is a whole gift basket of them waiting to be found out.

And the recent history of health in Newfoundland, with a crisis of confidence caused by botched tests for breast cancer, means that a health crisis for the Premier is GOING to be news. For the most part, the story hasn’t been too politicized — even opposition leaders are being mostly supportive — but there’s no guarantee that it will stay that way.

The results of all this have been — and will be — an ongoing laser-like focus on the story by Canadian media, while I would suspect the US attention will subside once Williams gets back to Canada. It’s just sad that Williams didn’t take the bull by the horns, provide the basic information, and then ask for privacy. A man of his considerable forcefulness likely would have gotten it.

The biggest surprise to me is that the strategy the Premier, and consequently the Newfoundland Government, is following must have been developed during the weeks of consultation Dunderdale mentioned to the media. This was the best they could do? Oy.

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