The public health system is „already underfunded,” any action to further cut public healthcare expenses will be dramatically felt by both employees and patients, Solidaritatea Sanitara (FSSR) trade union federation warned on Friday.

FSSR calls for scrapping all scenarios that would bring about a decrease in public healthcare expenses, including those aimed at decreasing some wage expenses, and for starting talks on measures that can generate an increase in funding the public healthcare system, thus being able to generate both an increase in the quality of healthcare services and an increase in the level of the reward granted to employees.

„Solidaritatea Sanitara Federation of Romania (FSSR) publicly draws the attention of the new majority that deals with the restructuring of government outlays that the public healthcare system is already underfunded, and any action to further cut expenses in this sector will be dramatically felt by both employees and patients.”

According to the unions, per capita public healthcare expenditure in Romania is 3.25 times lower than the average of the European Union states. It is approximately EUR 1,075 per year as against an EU average of EUR 3,500 per year.

According to FSSR, public healthcare spending in Romania is 5.36% of GDP, while elsewhere in the EU it averages 7.5% of GDP.

„Not only do we allocate too little for expenditures as against the EU average, but also the percentage of amounts allocated for health from the total budget outlays is lower in Romania (…) We find that instead of discussing solutions to increase healthcare funding and, with it, to increase the quality of healthcare services and the level of reward granted to employees (through correct payment, reporting bonuses to basic salaries in payment and introducing additional remuneration based on performance), we are also in a position to defend the poverty of the public healthcare system and, implicitly, of the incomes of the healthcare workers.”

AGERPRES