WILLEMSTAD – Attorney Lincoln Gomez says the court’s latest ruling against the Social Insurance Bank (SVB) in the Lab de Med thrombosis-care dispute has implications that extend far beyond healthcare, raising a fundamental question about the limits of authority exercised by government institutions.
Commenting on the judgment Sunday, Gomez argued that the central issue is not whether Curaçao should have one or several thrombosis services.
Instead, he says the case concerns whether a government institution can use a desirable policy objective to justify a decision when the necessary authority has not been provided by law.
The court recently overturned an SVB decision for the second time in the long-running dispute with Lab de Med.
Lab de Med wants access to billing code 70192 and the corresponding ANG 33.25 tariff for providing thrombosis services. The tariff was established by the SVB in 2016 at the request of the Analytisch Diagnostisch Centrum (ADC), which is currently the only provider permitted to bill the amount.
The SVB wants thrombosis care concentrated with one provider, arguing that allowing a second service could lead to duplication, fragmentation and additional healthcare costs.
The court did not conclude that concentrating thrombosis care with one provider is necessarily bad policy.
The problem, according to the judgment, is the legal foundation for giving one recognized healthcare provider exclusive access to reimbursement while excluding another.
For Gomez, that distinction is crucial.
A policy objective may be sensible or desirable, he argues, but that does not give an administrative body powers that have not been granted to it under the law.
The history of the case makes the issue particularly noteworthy, according to the attorney.
The SVB rejected Lab de Med’s request in April 2023 and maintained that position in late 2024. The court overturned that decision in December 2025 after finding that the legal basis used by the SVB did not support its position.
The SVB did not appeal that ruling.
Instead, it issued another rejection in January 2026 based on a different legal argument. The court has now determined that the new legal basis also fails to justify the decision.
Gomez considers it significant that after its first legal justification was rejected, the SVB returned with another argument in an attempt to maintain the same outcome.
That raises a broader question, he says: At what point should a government institution stop searching for another legal justification for an existing policy and instead reconsider the policy itself?
The latest judgment does not require the SVB to immediately allow Lab de Med to use the thrombosis-care tariff. The bank has been given another opportunity to reconsider the matter and either provide a legally valid basis for its position or reach a solution with Lab de Med.
For Gomez, however, the significance of the case extends beyond its eventual outcome.
It highlights the principle that public institutions must operate within powers explicitly granted to them by law, even when they believe their chosen policy serves efficiency, cost control or another legitimate public interest.