Doctors have reasons to refuse working in villages, says Minister

Medical institutions in rural regions are provided with only 45% of their personnel needs. That’s mainly because young specialists avoid go working there because of the lack of attractive conditions, says Health Minister Andrei Usatai. During a meeting with representatives of ProHealth Club, he stated that the Ministry developed policies of attracting young doctors in the rural regions, Info-Prim Neo reports. “Yearly, about 700 students get a license in medicine, but rural medical institutions remain without qualified personnel”, said Andrei Usatai. He admitted that young specialists were discouraged by low wages and obsolete equipment. The Minister said that some operation rooms barely lived up to that name, often having old equipment from 90s. However, Usatai says the budget of the Ministry of Health is too scarce to provide doctors with enough funds. According to him, an annual 4 billion lei is allotted from the budget for healthcare, a sum that isn’t enough for proper wages for medical workers. Andrei Usatai is confident that in the next weeks the Government will approve a project of raising salaries of medical workers by 50%. The Minister criticized the salary scheme as well. “The basic wage for most workers is 700 lei, plus a coefficient that is set by the head of the institution according to his personal preferences”, he said. The Minister of Health explained that the lack of qualified staff sometimes led to low quality services being provided by medical institutions. “The biggest issue is that the current medical personnel wouldn’t meet some certain criteria. It’s obvious things can’t be changed that easy”, said Andrei Usatai. He thinks that economic growth and foreign investments are needed for attracting young doctors in villages and for buying new medical equipment. Andrei Usatai announced that the Ministry of Health developed a set of policies that would be implemented in order to supply medical institutions with qualified workers and modern equipment.