Lombardy to be plaintiff in healthcare (3)

(ANSA) - Milan, April 11 - The Lombardy regional government will stand as civil plaintiff in the latest probe into corruption in the Lombardy health system, Governor Attilio Fontana told an ANSA Forum on Wednesday. "We have already tasked a lawyer, we'll make it formal in the next executive meeting, who will follow us as injured party, and we will stand as plaintiff" in the case involving two premier children's hospitals, Fontana said.
    Four hospital ward chiefs and a health agency manager were arrested in Milan Tuesday in connection with a probe into suspected healthcare kickbacks. Two of the ward chiefs were from the Pini Hospital and the other two from the Galeazzi Hospital. They and the health sector manager were placed under house arrest.
    Meanwhile, an entrepreneur in the sector was arrested and detained in jail.
    The five are accused of corruption.
    Those placed under house arrest were, for the Pini Orthopaedic Institute, its health manager Paola Navone; Giorgio Maria Calori, head of its surgery unit; and Carmine Cucciniello head of its corrective orthopaedics ward.
    For the Galeazzi, the head of the analysis lab Lorenzo Drago, and the head of reconstructive surgery, Carlo Luca Romanò, were placed under house arrest too. Tommaso Brenicci, the head of a Monza healthcare sector company, was placed under arrest in prison.
    Paola Navone, the Pini hospital manager, allegedly got a 1,000-euro Christmas basket, the promise of an internship for her daughter in one of the firms of detained entrepreneur Brenicci, and the payment of her expenses for conferences in Paris and Alto Adige, the investigations judge wrote in the warrant. In exchange, she allegedly authorised the introduction into the orthopaedic institute of a device to diagnose joint infections sold by Brenicci, at a company that was also linked to another two ward chiefs who were arrested.