Lacerda Sales routed PS members' requests to Santa Maria hospital director

Former Health Secretary of State Lacerda Sales forwarded requests from Socialist Party (PS) members to the former clinical director of Santa Maria Hospital, Luís Pinheiro, during the same period as the twins case in 2020, according to Público, based on the Public Prosecutor's investigation. The requests came from PS figures including MEP Ana Catarina Mendes and former Sintra mayor Edite Estrela, plus Rita Ferro Rodrigues, daughter of a former Assembly president, who sought palliative care for a terminally ill 30-year-old woman. Pinheiro responded even while on holiday, and requests also covered patient information and staff hiring. Forensic analysis of Sales's phone revealed deleted WhatsApp messages, notably with Nuno Rebelo de Sousa, son of the then-president, raising investigators' suspicions that Sales deliberately erased digital traces of key communications before a search of his home.