KDH Can Imagine Agreement on Changing System of Operating EMS

Bratislava, 10 August (TASR) - The opposition Christian Democrats (KDH) can imagine an agreement on changing the system of operating the emergency medical service (EMS), seeing no reason to compete for this critical infrastructure every six years, TASR was told by the KDH communications department on Sunday. KDH will support meaningful proposals that would lead to a change in the current set-up. "In our opinion, the ambulance service could be organised and operated by self-governing regions, as is the case in the neighbouring Czech Republic," said the communications department. MP Peter Stachura (KDH) sees no reason why the critical infrastructure of the state should be the subject of business. "Just as we don't compete for fire and police stations, we shouldn't compete for emergency medical care stations that provide emergency services," he said. According to KDH, any change to the system must guarantee quality and safe emergency health care for the people. The Christian Democrats regret that some parties of the ruling coalition are only now coming up with a proposal for systemic change. These changes could have been incorporated into the reform of the ambulance service as early as March, when the Health Ministry submitted the law to Parliament. The Slovak National Party announced on Saturday (9 August) that due to a non-transparent €2-billion ambulance service tender, it will propose that the entire rescue system be state-owned and fall under state control, expecting that this will save money. SNS hopes that the proposal will also be supported by coalition partners Voice-SD and Smer-SD. Premier Robert Fico (Smer-SD) is curious how the coalition Voice-SD party will deal with the proposal of the ruling SNS that the entire rescue system should be state-owned. "We can extend the licences for the current partners for some time and create enough time to consider how to proceed in this extremely lucrative part of the Slovak health-care system," he suggested. Voice-SD is willing to discuss the SNS proposal. am