The government on Tuesday passed an emergency ordinance regarding access of patients to medical services regardless of the providers' ownership, whether public or private, according to head of the Prime Minister's Chancellery Ionel Danca.
"Another much discussed piece of legislation lately in the public space and for which approval the government today decided to adopt an emergency ordinance is the one regarding access of patients to the providers of medical services regardless of their ownership, whether public or private. First, the objective of this piece of legislation is to save the lives of patients who are in critical condition during this time and have to resort to medical procedures. To facilitate their access to the nearest medical unit, the government has decided to open up the healthcare system and liberalise the healthcare programme so that patients can access medical services including those provided by private providers under the same conditions as the healthcare services provided by public facilities," Danca said on Tuesday evening, at the end of a government meeting.
He explained that the emergency "establishes the same conditions for the settlement of healthcare services for both the private and the public healthcare facilities," while at the same time, "repealing co-payment, the personal contribution provided by under Ordinance 27/2019, introduced by the previous Social Democratic Party (PSD) government, and extending the deadline for these personal contributions until April 2021."
"Patients will benefit from the same conditions, regardless of whether these medical services are provided by a public or private operator. It is a brave government act (...). It was under public debate lately, professional associations have been consulted, the medical sector and is an objective naturally taken up by a liberal government that wants to eliminate the discrimination between the public and the private sectors in order to increase the benefits to the patients who can access quality medical services, the closest ones, according to personal needs. We are talking about two national healthcare programmes: that regarding myocardial infarction and that dealing with stroke," said Danca. AGERPRES