The Wire

He’s now gone into Australian legend as our very own Dr Death, but when Dr Jayant Patel was a practising surgeon at the Bundaberg Base Hospital his incompetence was ignored. At least 17 patients died before a desperate nurse finally blew the whistle and even then it took a while for the system to stop protecting him. Journalist Hedley Thomas broke the story and has now written a book detailing the tragic trail left by the doctor whose background was never checked