PSD demands strengthened administrative, intervention capabilities for Health Ministry in public

Under a draft healthcare motion, the Social Democratic Party (PSD) is calling on Health Minister Patriciu Achimas-Cadariu to strengthen the administrative and intervention capabilities of the Health Ministry in issues of public health by reorganising the public healthcare system to endow it with inspection and control powers to identify, prevent and eradicate disease outbreaks endangering Romanians' health. 

PSD argues that defining protocols and procedures for the operation of the public healthcare systems is imperiously necessary, with minimal standards that each healthcare provider has to meet, starting with the family physicians and continuing with specialists outpatient care centres, with hospitals that, as well as treating emerging cases, provide the public with minimum knowledge, reads the draft motion obtained by AGERPRES on Sunday. 

"Likewise, a single inter-ministerial coordination centre should be set up with the Romanian Government for public healthcare issues that will gather all the areas involved in solving cases and preventing the emergence of other cases that will comprise officials from related areas: agriculture, the environment, administration and other organisations, as well as medical organisations, similar to the Department for Emergency Situations. Public information mechanisms should be established at the level of the Health Ministry, regional, local and county levels coordinated by a single functional coordination structure. Mr Minister, the hospitalisation capacity under the authority of the Health Ministry is badly needed as well as a correct ranking by hierarchy of hospitals in Romania. (...) We are asking you, Mr Minister, to set up a prophylaxis programme to avoid the medical staff falling ill. Last but not least, a national public information campaign by age brackets is needed about specific disease dangers and risks to make clear what additional measures the population is expected to take to prevent the emergence of new cases," reads the draft motion that could be called "The technical government is very much virus-stricken, frustrated and un-vaccinated!" 

"Healthcare is not a gamer, Mr Minister, but something fundamental to Romania! Before it is too late, do an honourable gesture and leave, because our children derive a medical system that steps in timely, they deserve full commitment, which you woefully miss! Enough with experiments, dilettantism and indifference, for the good of our children!" 

The draft also says the 2014-2020 National Healthcare Strategy approved by the Ponta Cabinet in November 2014, with a PSD majority, is Romania's commitment to securing and promoting health as a key determinant of the Romanian society's sustainable development, as an engine for national progress and prosperity; it is a framework document designed to eliminate the weaknesses identified in the public healthcare sector: ironing out inequities in the healthcare system, optimising the use of resources against value-for-money principles and improving administrative and managerial capabilities at all levels. Essential to the success of the strategy, PSD argues, is the involvement and action of institutional players and specialists. Its success depends on the successful promotion of a new paradigm that sets healthy men as the objective of the healthcare system. 

"We are asking you, Mr Minister, to respect and define in the period immediately ahead the intervention programmes undertaken by PSD for breastfeeding promotion, prophylaxis of malnutrition in babies of a small weight at birth, healthy foods and prophylaxis of obesity in children, increasing access to adequate nursing in regional facilities for the new-borns at risk of neonatal death, strengthening neonatal screening capabilities, updating/drawing up practice guides, including for community nurses and midwives while promoting integrated management of childhood diseases and training primary care nurses for maternities and NGOs. At the same time, we are calling on you to secure, under the programmes mentioned above, access to early diagnosis, adequate monitoring and diversified primary care services, with emphasis on prophylaxis. (...) The [incumbent] technical government is very much virus-stricken, frustrated and un-vaccinated! These are some of the spoken and written words of Romania's parents and children worried about the unfavourable developments in their healthcare as well as about the Romanian healthcare system. (...) The PSD MP group, after conducting local and national analysis, as well as Social-Democratic MPs and community leaders believe that healthcare and education are two propitiates each Romanian deems important. Each child has a right to life. Each parent is entitled to know what to do to have a healthy child. Each parent wants a heathy child. The tragedy of parents losing their children [to the system] has to stop! Gaucheries in the healthcare system should no longer bury our children!" says PSD. 

The unqualified healthcare motion mentioned this week by PSD national leader Liviu Dragnea could be completed early next week, most likely at a convention of the party's National Standing Bureau. AGERPRES