The Civic Platform (PO) is in favour of partial privatisation of health services, the establishment of a realistic ‘basket of guaranteed services’ and competition on the insurance market. This is the way forward, PO leader Donald Tusk told Polish Radio Three.
When asked what should be done for the health service, Tusk answered: "Please appreciate the fact that the set of actions we propose, are not actions aimed at gaining popularity. When we speak about partial privatisation of medical services, including hospitalisation, when we keep reminding about a realistic basket of guaranteed services, namely about a precise definition of it - which means a shorter list of services the patient gets for his insurance premium, when we speak about a private insurance market, these are not popular proposals ".
"We have the courage to say that, we had the courage to include all this in PO’s program declarations, but please don’t be disillusioned. The government led by PM Kaczyński says a very clear ‘no’ and it is their right as they won the election”, he stressed.
If the government says ‘no’ to PO’s proposals, “it is their bounden duty to tell Poles what their vision of the health service is. And that is something they cannot or don’t want to do", he judged.
Tusk criticised PM’s actions in respect of the health service strike: "Jarosław Kaczyński is the head of this government and after four weeks of the protest, the only sensible utterance of his was the one about the referendum”.
Tusk emphasised that he expected head of Polish government "to tell Poles what things should look like, to take responsibility for the direction of changes, instead of saying what he won’t do ".
PO leader hopes to see a solution to the conflict between the government and doctors and nurses soon: "We’ve heard many announcements (of an agreement). A situation when nurses are in the street outside the prime minister’s office and doctors are on hunger strike is so abnormal, so dangerous from the average citizen’s point of view that I’m ready to go down on my knees and beg both parties to the conflict to sit down together at the table soon and discuss what should be done in order to break the vicious circle of mutual misunderstanding and accusations", said Donald Tusk.