The state of our health is bad despite the countless “ants” and capable individuals and groups! As a specialist doctor at the clinic, involved in the organization and system of work before 1990, elected to the 1990 Independence Assembly, I must write that health care was in a disastrous financial situation that year and far from what the successors of the communist regime want to show today. In addition, it should be noted (Document about Privileges, issued by the Ministry of Justice in 2008) that there was no “public” health care for the privileged caste of Communist Party members at the time.
They organized their own, “private” one, within the Emona Hospital with special budget money! Today, problems with the environment in the Posočje, Mežica, Celje and many other places speak of party indifference to people’s health! It’s true that there were no queues because we employees did everything for the money from the budget, but when we ran out of it, we printed it out. Remember the inflation! With the establishment of the Health Insurance Company, with the adoption of the tolar and later the euro, this was no longer possible and problems began to accumulate! They started to accumulate because in all 30 years we have not been able to make the reform that would be urgently needed for objective reasons (aging, increasingly expensive medicine, the difficulty of patients), and they have done it in other European countries! Regarding where we really are in the field of healthcare between OECD and EU countries today, we need to look at Health at the Glance 2019 (where it is clear where we are bad) and the Euro Health Consumer Index (where we are in 21st place in the society in the field of healthcare of not very reputable countries). The sight will sober us up. The situation is not bad due to private health care in Slovenia, which is practically non-existent, but due to the situation in health care in our country, which does not adapt to epidemiology, it is poorly funded, organized, and managed. All this stems from the ideologisation and politicisation of health care, done by the left, which has been leading and managing this health care system for at least 23 years out of the 30 years of independence!
I do not want and cannot be an advocate of the private sector as well as a critic of public health. However, the fact is that in countries where they have better health care than us, they have sought and found the right path and the right relationship between public and private. Western countries (almost all) do not have only public or only private health care. Healthcare is not financed and implemented only in the public or private sector! (Canada’s Health Care System: An Overview of Public and Private Participation, Health, Education & Social Welfare: Jay Makarenko; Health, Education & Social Welfare, Oct 22, 2010). Even in Canada, where health care is primarily funded by public money, the private sector plays an important role, especially in areas where there are “loopholes” in insurance! However, it is true that the state sets the standards of work (where are these in our country?), and the contractors negotiate the prices directly with the insurance companies (they are set by the HIIS in our country)! A good health care system is important for social security and must ensure solidarity in funding, fairness in access and quality assurance!
This is written in the Ljubljana Charter from June 19th, 1996, but we do not adhere to it in our, not public, but state system. At the same time, some, for which they even use the harmful protests of “cyclists”, are fighting for public, sorry, for state health care, which brings them benefits! No one is abolishing public health! The fact is that we need a reform of services (fragmentation, management) and a reform of financing! The left does not care, because the current system, so to speak exclusively state-owned, provides them with control over financial flows in procurement and thus corruption, which they “fight with all their might”. Hence the shouting and screaming of the opposition when purchasing medical equipment, because the margins (not the commissions) did not go into the right hands! It should be emphasized that both systems have bad and good features (due to the volume of the text, I cannot go into this), which must be covered with regulation by the state, and this is also happening in developed countries! It is certainly important to establish competitiveness, which is not present in our national planned health care! In most countries, the public-private ratio is 70%: 30%, with 30% of the private sector largely financed by public funds! The debate over whether there should be public or private health care is therefore ideological and ordinary politicking! It is sand in the eyes of the people in which the left is very skilled, the successor to party habits, which also controls all the central media! Our “independent” media, led by RTVS, have recently played an important role in managing public opinion on what we need, recently in relation to COVID-19! They are “selling” their truth that the current government is not in control of the crisis, and in a way that this is only happening to us. The next moment, they report about a bad situation in Europe, but the original impression on the viewer, the listener remains! Not a single sentence so far has mentioned that it appears that there has never been such a big gap in our knowledge between what we need to know and what we know! No, for our central media the problem are dr. Krek and Mr. Kacin. Funny, harmful!
And finally, let me set up a mirror with something else for RTVS: a doctor from Maribor was brought to Tarča, who recently told for Večer that intuition, inner intelligence, and an open heart are the answer to all questions and a cure for all diseases. Really amazing choice of interlocutor! At the same time, he encouraged opposing to the actions of the profession and the government!