Health Minister Dr. Duane Sands  has confirmed that the Public Hospitals Authority’s (PHA) institutions were experiencing a cyber attack last week.

In a release last week, the PHA advised the general public of the attack as of Saturday March 30th. 

The disruption,  said the Authority, is primarily centered on the internal email system, resulting in a lack of access to emails, both internally and externally.

 However, the Authority’s medical information systems continued to function, and based upon its review, no patient information has been compromised. 

Dr Sands said, “the systems are up now. So, it has been addressed. It was dealt with through our internal team. There was certainly significant inconvenience with those challenges with internal system communications, affecting imaging and the labs, and the pharmacy; but most of those systems are back up.” 

When asked what’s being done to prevent a reoccurrence, he said, “let me put it this way. Even the pentagon can be hacked; but the system has a firewall protection. They have anti-viral protection, etc.; but depending on the expertise of the individual, you can get even beyond that.”

He added, “fortunately, the attack was contained, and no patient information was compromised. It also did not prevent us from being able to provide care.” 

The PHA indicated that a comprehensive investigation into this matter was held in conjunction with both local and international partners.