SaS: Hospital Transformation and Supplemental Insurance Can Help Improve Sector

Bratislava, 17 July (TASR) - The opposition Freedom and Solidarity (SaS) party wants to transform state-run hospitals into joint-stock companies, introduce supplemental insurance, improve drugs policy and make outpatient doctors more available as part of ten measures aimed at improving the Slovak health-care system that it presented at a press conference on Thursday. "We've looked at this agenda as people who are also waiting to be examined in doctors' waiting rooms, as people who are looking for paediatricians for their children, as people who feel that the health-care sector has been neglected in recent years, even though it's a very important sector. All the measures that we're going to present are rightist ones, as it's important that we present rightist measures in all areas, these are measures that will help Slovakia," said SaS leader Branislav Groehling. SaS views it as important to first of all "clean up" the Health Ministry. "Management will only work when the managerial body is functioning," stated MP Tomas Szalay (SaS), adding that at the moment "the right hand at the ministry doesn't know what the left one is doing". According to the party, it's also important to set goals in the sector so that every euro is spent in an effective manner. The allocation of funds should be conditional on achieving goals, proposes SaS. The party also considers it important to improve the functioning of hospitals, viewing the transformation of state-run hospitals into joint-stock companies as necessary in this regard. "It isn't a panacea, but it's a necessary prerequisite for responsibility to begin to rule there," said Szalay. SaS further proposes introducing the option of supplemental insurance so that each policyholder can choose an insurance plan according to their needs. It also believes that state-run health insurer Vseobecna zdravotna poistovna needs to be divided up, sold and the money invested in constructing new hospitals. SaS has the ambition to improve drugs policy, which it claims isn't working. For example, it proposes using cheaper drugs such as generics and biosimilars and using more money to refund new drugs. ko/df