ROME. Fee «on negligence" for those who book a visit and then do not show up at the clinic. Ticket, to be agreed with the Regions, for the hospitalization of high-income patients and for non-emergency services required in the emergency room. But also the fight against waste, including the funds allocated and never spent by the health bureaucracy. Health Minister Livia Turco anticipates the measures prepared amidst the anvil of the Budget law which threatens cuts to public service and the hammer of the mass media which denounce scandalous waste in hospitals.
Minister, does health care equal abyss of taxpayers' money?
«How can you deny money badly spent, cathedrals in the desert. As soon as I set foot in the ministry, I discovered money allocated and not spent to modernize the hospital network. It is shameful that the public administration has yet to learn that the time factor in politics is decisive. The most intolerable waste is the unused appropriations for radiotherapy, hospices for terminally ill patients, "intramoenia" treatments, diagnostic tools. Let's run for cover with a new law that will allow investments in healthcare to update technologies and structures, especially in the South. I am finalizing an agreement with Minister Pierluigi Bersani to obtain structural funds to be allocated to large health investments. Healthcare must become a factor of development and not just a measure of equity"
Meanwhile, easy recipes and hospitalizations cost the state ten billion too much every year…
«Listen, I have given myself the mission of overturning the indifferent stereotype and talking about good health. We are fed up with the tam tam about medical malpractice and waste. As a minister I feel the ethical duty to promote a campaign that highlights the great health care that exists in Italy, otherwise we say falsehoods, create distrust in citizens and fail to promote the right to health. There are excellent professionals in our hospitals and the World Health Organization certifies that the Italian system is one of the best. Of course, it is different (Tuscany and Emilia are one thing, unfortunately the South is another) and serious waste persists».
“Scandals must come to light", says the Gospel...
«But, look, that placing the emphasis on medical malpractice is instrumental, it is done in an interested way to cause patients to flee to private facilities. Undermining the trust in the relationship between citizens and the public system only serves to enrich healthcare entrepreneurs. I meet extraordinary doctors every day who ask to be valued in their professionalism, to be involved, to count more and who don't talk to you about money. Then there are also the slackers who think of escaping immediately from the public hospital to go to the clinic. Thank God, however, despite the Berlusconi government has unfortunately removed the exclusivity of the relationship, the 95% of doctors has chosen public structures ».
Now the tug of war is on the national health fund: Minister Padoa-Schioppa proposes 95 billion euros, you ask for 96, the Regions 98. How will it end?
«As you can see the distances are not huge, so we will find an agreement. I guarantee that there will be no cuts, but an adjustment of resources for public health and dis
