SAR report: "Is the Romanian Health going in coma?" Measures delayed, it probably will

The quality of medical services is much below the European standards, patients decry the maltreatment in hospitals and the need to pay informally for services which, theoretically, are supposed to be free. The budget allocated for the Romanian Health department for 2009 dropped almost 20% against the last year’s sum. These are all conclusions of the Romanian Academic Society report launched on November 24: „Is the Romanian Health going in coma?”.

SAR makes an analysis of the health and pharmaceutical policy in Romania, showing that the recent deterioration of the Romanian sanitary system is triggered by sub-financing and the lack of reform, by the opaque decisions and rushes of new prices for drugs, overtaxes and the distorted fund allocation.

European Healthcare Index: Romania ranks 32 in a top of 33 countries

Romania is currently situated on the 32nd position in a group of 33 European countries. In 2008, Romania took the 27th position in a group of 31 countries in the European Healthcare Index. According to the report, Romania’s healthcare performance is tagged with weak when it comes to patients’ waiting time, fairly weak for patients’ right to information, the weakest for e-Health, weak for the services’ equity (including the informal payments in the system) and very weak for drug supply (including co-payments and access to new medicine).

Romania allocated in 2009 the lowest budget for Health in the last nine years. Public funds for health drop 7.9% if considered in lei and 10.9% if considered in euros, namely 3.2% of a GDP dropping 8%. A last minute rectification allowed for an engagement of 2.8 billion lei. It has been rumoured that without this add-on, the Romanian Health system would have collapsed in September 2009.

Romania bottoms almost every list on Health in Europe, much behind EU members, competing with Ukraine. The Romanian Academic Society (SAR) says the crisis in the medical and pharmaceutical departments has all chances to worsen in the months to follow. SAR carries out investigations on health issues, following the launch if their report on September 28: „The end of drugs? An analysis of the market and policy regarding the Romanian pharmaceutical products”. The report indicates that the funds allocated for the Romanian Health are not so much impoverished by the global market evolution or by the raising costs of research and development of new medicine, but the also deficiencies of the system.