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HEALTH

Health insurers warn of system breakdown

Facing a deficit of €11 billion next year, Germany’s statutory health insurers are in such trouble that the whole system is teetering and could collapse, the insurers’ peak body has warned.

Health insurers warn of system breakdown

“The insurers’ situation is dramatic. This year the health funds are standing on the edge of the abyss. Next year, they will take a step even closer,” said Doris Pfeiffer, head of the Association of Statutory Health Insurers, according to news magazine Der Spiegel.

The problem that has been ignored by successive governments is the runaway costs in the health sector, she said.

Health funds will need to pay out at least 35 percent more this year to hospitals than they did in 1998. Payments to resident doctors have risen more than 40 percent.

“If a fund has a lot of low income-earners, they have to ask all the more of members with higher incomes, which has the effect of driving people away. It’s a vicious circle,” said Pfeiffer.

The overwhelming majority of Germans are covered by one of hundreds of these statutory insurers. The coalition government is urgently debating ways to bring down the costs of health care and keep the insurers financially viable.

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HEALTH

Lengthy waiting times at Danish hospitals not going away yet: minister

Danish Minister for the Interior and Health Sophie Løhde has warned that, despite increasing activity at hospitals, it will be some time before current waiting lists are reduced.

Lengthy waiting times at Danish hospitals not going away yet: minister

The message comes as Løhde was set to meet with officials from regional health authorities on Wednesday to discuss the progress of an acute plan for the Danish health system, launched at the end of last year in an effort to reduce a backlog of waiting times which built up during the coronavirus crisis.

An agreement with regional health authorities on an “acute” spending plan to address the most serious challenges faced by the health services agreed in February, providing 2 billion kroner by the end of 2024.

READ ALSO: What exactly is wrong with the Danish health system?

The national organisation for the health authorities, Danske Regioner, said to newspaper Jyllands-Posten earlier this week that progress on clearing the waiting lists was ahead of schedule.

Some 245,300 operations were completed in the first quarter of this year, 10 percent more than in the same period in 2022 and over the agreed number.

Løhde said that the figures show measures from the acute plan are “beginning to work”.

“It’s positive but even though it suggests that the trend is going the right way, we’re far from our goal and it’s important to keep it up so that we get there,” she said.

“I certainly won’t be satisfied until waiting times are brought down,” she said.

“As long as we are in the process of doing postponed operations, we will unfortunately continue to see a further increase [in waiting times],” Løhde said.

“That’s why it’s crucial that we retain a high activity this year and in 2024,” she added.

Although the government set aside 2 billion kroner in total for the plan, the regional authorities expect the portion of that to be spent in 2023 to run out by the end of the summer. They have therefore asked for some of the 2024 spending to be brought forward.

Løhde is so far reluctant to meet that request according to Jyllands-Posten.

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