Just a few months after a Solomon Islands court acquitted the prime suspect in the murder of former business manager and missionary Lance Gersbach, the safety of employees at the Seventh-day Adventist Church’s Atoifi hospital remains a concern.

Pastor Laurie Evans, president of the church in the South Pacific, recently visited with hospital staff and village chiefs to discuss the hospital’s future.

Another concern is low staff morale and “unreasonable” workloads.

While empathizing with staff members, Evans cautioned them not to condemn the Kaiwo people in general because of the actions of only one or two people.

Evans reaffirmed the church’s commitment to continue its health and medical ministry in the Solomons. However, he spoke openly about reviewing the operations at the Atoifi hospital, “one, because Lance’s murderer has not been brought to justice—and we’re doing everything in our power to see that this happens—and two, because we’d like to expand our influence for the benefit of all Solomon Islanders, not just those living near Atoifi.”

The chiefs, whom Evans thanked for allowing the church to operate the hospital on their land for the past 38 years—agreed to examine how they might resolve the issue of the non-capture of the murderer. Evans says the future of the hospital rests largely with them.

“They have the ability to deal with this matter better than anyone,” Evans says. “They acknowledge the pain the murder has caused. And they understand we would like to expand our health and medical ministry. But they made it clear they do not want the hospital to close.

“I emphasized the successful apprehending and conviction of the perpetrator of this crime would do much to allay the fears of the staff and help restore confidence in Atoifi,” Evans adds.

The church established Atoifi in 1965. The 80-bed hospital serves the eastern half of Malaita and is the only private health care institution in the Solomon Islands that provides training for nurses.