With your letter to Parliament, Panhellenic Medical Association warns that the mental health law “will be a permanent disincentive to the creation of doctors in numerically deficient specialties in insular and demographically challenged areas”.
The specific article establishes that “private doctors who have any employment relationship in Health Units contracted with the National Organization for the Provision of Health Services (EOPYY) or who are themselves contracted with EOPYY, assume through the above-mentioned contracts the obligation to offer health services to meet needs that may put public health at risk, if requested and only for the time absolutely necessary. The provision of these services is done on a part-time basis, since advertisements to fill vacancies have been unsuccessful, the expression of interest by private doctors in filling vacant positions has been unsuccessful”.
It further stipulates that “if private providers or private doctors contracted by EOPYY refuse to provide services, their contract with EOPYY shall be terminated. Furthermore, private doctors who refuse to provide services under the terms of the previous paragraphs, whether or not contracted by EOPYY, shall be denied access to the Electronic Prescription System (ESIS) of the public limited company called “Administração Electrónica da Segurança Social” (IDICA SA)”.
The letter
Below is the letter from the Panhellenic Medical Association.
“To the Parliament of the Hellenic Republic
Honourable Ladies and Gentlemen
The enactment of Article 65 of the Mental Health Bill, in addition to the serious legislative flaws highlighted by the Parliament’s Legal Service, will permanently damage and poison the relations of the entire medical community in the country with the Greek State. It will be a permanent disincentive to the deployment of doctors in numerically deficient specialties in islands and areas with demographic problems, as well as a disincentive for new colleagues to choose these specialties. These will be added to the disincentives of the contract with EOPYY and the establishment of a personal doctor. And its activation will result in the absolute inadequacy of health services in the aforementioned areas for the specific specialties. The country’s medical community has proven its consistency in its mission by resolving the communication problem that arose for an incomprehensible reason since July 4, despite the threats, ironies, challenges and inconsistencies of the Ministry of Health. It was preceded in full by the responsible exercise of our functions as advisor to the State, both by the Panhellenic Medical Association and by local medical associations, with the timely highlighting of the problem (2022, 2023, January 2024) and the submission of applicable proposals. which were ignored. After all, approximately the same problem was resolved last year quietly and effectively through our cooperation, initially with the then acting Minister of Health and then with her “inexperienced in health matters” but effective successor. In any case, today these provisions, in addition to being harmful, are also unnecessary. The statement of non-issuance of relevant ministerial provisions raises the reasonable question of the purpose of the law. Not only does it not reassure us, it also deprives us of the possibility of appealing to the Greek courts and European institutions and organizations. In medical terms, this will cause a condition similar to chronic osteomyelitis, that is, a condition with remissions and exacerbations, daily discomfort, dirty wounds, multiple surgical and therapeutic interventions that sometimes end in amputation. And, in fact, this will be caused in the health sector, which is facing the development of chronic intractable problems of explosive proportions. Problems that the facts make clear that the state, without the active participation of the medical world through its institutions, is unable to solve. Ultimately, it is a shame to solve the corresponding problem of the shortage of pathologists, radiologists, anaesthetists and laboratory doctors from our European partners at the expense of our country.
The Panhellenic Medical Association and all Medical Associations in the country urge that this critical error be avoided. After all, the prestige of doctors and the State is judged by the resolution and not by the complication of problems.
Best regards
President Dr. Athanasios Hexadaktylos
Secretary General Dimitris Varnavas”.