Former Minister of Health and famous heart surgeon Professor Zbigniew Religa told Polish Radio One this morning that he feels deceived by the ruling Civic Platform and its policy on Polish hospitals which would effectively privatise the system.

Opposition Law and Justice MP Religa explained that last year Civic Platform was dissociating itself from the idea of privatising the health care system in Poland and now the party appears to be coming back to the idea.

Religa stressed that it is impossible to hand hospitals over to local governments, which is the government’s plan, because they are already locally governed.

He added that the previous government, in which he was health minister, did not exclude the possibility of privatisation of hospitals, but only if the “majority shareholding” belonged to the local governments.

According to Religa, the current proposition by Civic Platform creates the possibility of unrestricted privatisation. At the same time, he declared that he is in favour of the strong public health care system in Poland coexisting with the private sector.

The former health minister said that the solution to the Polish health care crisis is to “seal” the system so that no money is wasted and at the same time to increase expenditures in this field.

Last week Minister of Health Ewa Kopacz denied that the government wanted to privatise health care, but simply to make each hospital financially autonomous but under the control of the local government. (jm)