In June one year ago Veneto had 128,000 patients on the waiting list to receive a healthcare service to be ensured within 30 days of the request, today there are 17,000: therefore, “it has been thinned out well and I thank those who work in healthcare”. But there is also the other side of the coin, the very few vocations to be a doctor. “Very few enrollments in specializations for general surgery, none for radiotherapy… This means – says Luca Zaia, president of the Veneto– that there is a lack of doctors and this can also be seen in the specialization phases”. So should we call them ‘coin-operated’? In Veneto 3,500 doctors are missing and Zaia hopes that “we can have those on permanent staff by finding them”. Azienda zero issues an announcement every three days “but many have unfilled positions because there are no candidates”. In short, he suggests, it’s hard like this. And the problem risks adding to the problem. The pension equalization mechanism risks having a downside: the loss of the co-pay exemption for specialist healthcare services for elderly people whose families have a total gross income of more than 36,000 euros. There are regions that have tried to stem this problem, not the Veneto where CISL and FNP, the pensioners’ acronym, are therefore asking the Region for a solution. The proposal for a corrective measure was sent to the Health Councilor in recent days Veneto Manuela Lanzarin, with a letter requesting a meeting. “While waiting for a national provision, for which as CISL we are lobbying the Government, we believe the introduction of a regional exemption with a higher income limit is necessary in the meantime”.
According to Gianfranco Refosco, secretary of CISL Veneto, it is a “question of fair access to services and the right to health, which for many elderly people and their families clearly risks being undermined”. For elderly people aged 65 and over, the family income limit to be exempt from paying tickets is set at national level at 36,151.98 euros. Limit established in 1998: in lire it was 70 million, the figure was transformed into euros and never updated over the years. The problem is that this limit can now be easily exceeded even by families with low pensions: for example, two net pensions of 1,100 euros per month are enough to exceed the limit and lose the exemption.
“From some reports of pensioners who have had their ticket exemption revoked, we studied the problem and carried out an information campaign to collect further data”, explains Tina Cupani, secretary of the Fnp Veneto. “Equalization is a right and serves to link the amount of pensions to inflation. Already the distortions of the mechanism in force in Italy have not defended the effective purchasing power of pensioners, which has collapsed over the years, but losing even important support such as the exemption for health benefits, which are frequent in old age, is truly a mockery” . At a local level, the CISL and FNP Veneto ask the Region for a regional exemption as has been done in Lombardy and in the autonomous province of Bolzano. The Lombardy Region, for example, already introduced in 2007 an exemption from the ticket for elderly people whose family income is between 36,151.98 and 38,500 euros. “Surely a provision of this kind would also protect many elderly people in Veneto who are now in the balance”
Did you like this article? Share it on:
Print this news
