FROM EIR DAILY ALERT

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Greek Government Cuts Funding to Health System in Half

Aug. 22, 2018 (EIRNS)—Everyone is celebrating Greece’s ending its bailout program this week, but nothing is said about the huge damage done to the economy, which destructive process will continue, as surveillance will continue to 2060. Responding to Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras’s declaration on Aug. 21 that Greece is closing the door on austerity, the country’s union of public hospital workers (POEDIN) revealed the devastation caused by the austerity.

Since 2010, when Greece signed its first international bailout, the number of permanent employees at hospitals has been slashed by 25,000, while state funding for hospitals has been halved from €1.5 billion euros in 2015 to just €786 million this year. Half of the equipment in state hospitals have exceeded their life expectancy while acute doctor shortages persist on the islands. On Ithaca, for instance, which Tsipras visited on Aug. 21 to make his speech, the health center has just six doctors, three of whom are set to retire this year, POEDIN said.