Political instability is "harmful" to hospitals, at a time when the executive is normally working on the future budget for social security, and health must be a "priority" for the start of the school year, declared the president of the French Hospital Federation on Wednesday, calling for a minister to be appointed "quickly".
During the summer period, when hospitals are "particularly mobilized" to allow continuity of care, despite tensions on human resources, they have this year redoubled their efforts to strengthen their capacities during the Olympic Games, recalled, during an interview with AFP, the president of the FHF Arnaud Robinet.
In the emergency room, the situation "is similar" to previous summers with reception "generally maintained", even if in some places it is conditional on a prior call to the emergency services. For the Olympic Games, the establishments "are in working order" and the services "will remain accessible", he assured.
Asked about the political situation, he recalled that in the summer, usually, "we start working with the ministerial offices concerned on the development of the Social Security Financing Bill (PLFSS)" for the following year, normally presented in September. "This is not the case today," he regretted.
"This worries us, given the very poor situation in the public hospital," he said.
"If we have no government, no interlocutor, an Assembly divided into three blocks, we risk having to renew the PLFSS of 2024, which would be very damaging for the entire health system," he warned.
"The President of the Republic must, beyond political contingencies," appoint "a government capable of working as quickly as possible," he argued.
He called for the appointment of a "full" Minister of Health, and not a delegated minister, because Health "must be a priority for the State."
"The public hospital will approach the start of the school year in a very degraded situation, with a deficit of 1.7 billion euros in 2023", and "the Ehpad are in the same situation: 80% of them are in deficit", recalled Mr. Robinet.
The FHF therefore calls on the future government to "guarantee the sustainability of the public hospital" in its decisions and to take inflation into account, while according to it, there was a "missing" of 1.3 billion euros in the budget for 2024 to compensate for the increase in prices.
Among the "priorities of the political return", the executive will have to support certain disciplines, "mainly provided by the public hospital", which suffer from "under-recourse to care" and therefore "under-funding", he argued.
Hospital activity, which has slowed down considerably since the Covid-19 pandemic, will restart in 2023, but not enough for the most serious care, in particular "digestive care, cardiology, the nervous system and rheumatology", he said.
In a press release, the FHF also recalls the commitment of the previous government to create 50,000 positions by 2030 in nursing homes, and asks that "this objective be met".
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