A
top Spanish health charity has warned that Prime Minister Marino
Rajoy’s cuts to the healthcare sector are blocking hundreds of thousands
of people from accessing medical treatments.
The warning by Medicos del Mundo came on Tuesday, while it launched a campaign against the healthcare cuts.
"The impact we have seen in the year since the reform is simply devastating," said charity President Alvaro Gonzalez, adding, “The cuts to healthcare are especially harming those most affected by the recession: immigrants, people looking after those with special needs, families on low incomes and pensioners."
According to official figures, 873,000 people have lost access to free public healthcare since September 2012, when the government imposed the massive cuts to the healthcare sector.
The government reforms also included forcing chronically-ill patients to pay for medication dispensed at hospital.
"This has meant that 16 percent of the pensioners in our country are being cast out of the healthcare system because they cannot meet the cost of paying for medicine for their chronic illnesses," Gonzalez said.
The charity president also commented on Rajoy’s recent claims that the country’s economic crisis is easing by saying, "The government is insisting that the economy is recovering ... but still our health system, which in past years was the envy of neighboring countries, is suffering one cut after another."
Helena Legido-Quigley, a Spanish researcher from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, said when Greece imposed similar reforms two years ago it led to a rise in HIV infection and outbreaks of malaria.
"What's happening in Greece could happen in Spain because it's going the same way in terms of the reforms," said Legido-Quigley.
Battered by the global financial downturn, the Spanish economy collapsed into recession in the second half of 2008, taking millions of jobs with it.
The Spanish government has been sharply criticized over its austerity measures that are hitting the middle and working classes the hardest.
Source: Press TV, 25 September 2013
The warning by Medicos del Mundo came on Tuesday, while it launched a campaign against the healthcare cuts.
"The impact we have seen in the year since the reform is simply devastating," said charity President Alvaro Gonzalez, adding, “The cuts to healthcare are especially harming those most affected by the recession: immigrants, people looking after those with special needs, families on low incomes and pensioners."
According to official figures, 873,000 people have lost access to free public healthcare since September 2012, when the government imposed the massive cuts to the healthcare sector.
The government reforms also included forcing chronically-ill patients to pay for medication dispensed at hospital.
"This has meant that 16 percent of the pensioners in our country are being cast out of the healthcare system because they cannot meet the cost of paying for medicine for their chronic illnesses," Gonzalez said.
The charity president also commented on Rajoy’s recent claims that the country’s economic crisis is easing by saying, "The government is insisting that the economy is recovering ... but still our health system, which in past years was the envy of neighboring countries, is suffering one cut after another."
Helena Legido-Quigley, a Spanish researcher from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, said when Greece imposed similar reforms two years ago it led to a rise in HIV infection and outbreaks of malaria.
"What's happening in Greece could happen in Spain because it's going the same way in terms of the reforms," said Legido-Quigley.
Battered by the global financial downturn, the Spanish economy collapsed into recession in the second half of 2008, taking millions of jobs with it.
The Spanish government has been sharply criticized over its austerity measures that are hitting the middle and working classes the hardest.
Source: Press TV, 25 September 2013
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