Bulgarian Medical Union Insists on Urgent Meeting with Prime Minister

The Bulgarian Medical Union sent an open letter to Prime Minister Boyko Borissov. The BMA requested an urgent meeting with the Prime Minister and issued an ultimatum.

For nearly ten months now, Bulgarian medics have been on the frontline, sparing no efforts and demonstrating stoicism, selflessness and self-sacrifice in the fight against the epidemic. Many of our colleagues are currently struggling for their lives, and over 50 medics have died.

Bulgarian Medical Union closely monitors the measures taken by the state to deal with the difficult situation our country is facing and we believe that for the most part they are adequate and timely. We are familiar with the next year budget of the NHIF and that of the state and the planned buffers for the fight against the Covid-19 epidemic. Bulgarian Medical Union is fully aware of its role as an organization that must support the process of timely and correct implementation of the measures taken and their timely reach to our colleagues.

But unfortunately, for the whole period from March to now, against the background of thousands of fates marked by Covid-19, the management of the National Health Insurance Fund (NHIF) behaves as if the epidemic does not exist and disregards the seriousness of the situation. Any of the anti-epidemic measures announced by the National Operational Staff or Council of Ministers instead of being implemented urgently is applied with an extremely long delay due to purposeful attempts at delay, bureaucratic approach and administrative setbacks by the management of the NHIF.

From the announcement of the decision to open Covid wards in all medical facilities to concluding contracts with hospitals that had not...