PAME (All Workers Militant Front) – PASEVE (Panhellenic Antitrust Coalition of Tradesmen – Craftsmen) – PASY (All Farmers Militant Coalition) – MAS (Students’ Militant Front) – OGE (Federation of Women in Greece)

ANNOUNCEMENT

Workers and employees, tradesmen – craftsmen, self-employed people, small to medium scale farmers,

Women and young people of the popular families,

Unemployed people, pensioners, migrant men and women,

            PAME, PASEVE, PASY, MAS and OGE call you to build a strong popular front of struggle for the right of all people in modern, free and public health services.

            The government is going to eliminate 3,000 beds and 330 clinics in public hospitals through the recent measures it has already announced. Moreover, the government is going to give 500 beds to private insurance companies in order for them to have profits. All these mean a rapid aggravation of the popular needs for Health. They leave no room for waiting and illusions.

            We must not lose even one second. We must act now. Our health is at risk. We must now take the case into our hands; we must utilize the power of the organized struggle and of the social alliance to stop the criminal policy of the government and its allies at the expense of the health of the people.

            We must not allow our medical and hospital care or welfare to become expensive goods that are constantly becoming even more expensive, unreachable for the popular family.

            The government, E.U. and the capital, through the poor conditions of work and life that they impose on workers and their families, they cause short-term and long-term damage to their health.  

            This is the result of the lengthening of working hours, the flexible forms of employment, the lack of health and safety measures, unemployment, the reduction of wages and pensions in order to provide / ensure cheaper workers for the greater profitability of the big business.

            Simultaneously, they reduce the public benefits of Health – Welfare to a minimum level and transform this popular need into a field of business activity and profitability in the “public” and private sector.

Ø    They say that Health is expensive, that the state can not afford this expense.

The truth is that the state can not afford and considers waste only whatever provides the minimum protection and care of health, that is left, since it obstructs the competitiveness of monopolies.

The state does not have money for the popular health, but it has financed the business groups in the field of health with 850 billion euros over the past 5 years.

Ø    They say that through mergers and shut down of hospitals, health units and welfare institutions they will reduce the operating costs and they will better use the infrastructures. 

They are dangerous. They plan to shrink even more the current insufficient public system. The plan of the government is the closure of 10,000 public beds and the additional commitment of a percentage of beds to the private insurance companies. 

            They do not care about the waiting lists for admission to hospitals, which will be increased. There will be no beds for emergencies, for ICU, surgeries etc. They do not care whether people who suffer long-time diseases, old and disabled people can not be admitted in an institution or a rehabilitation centre. They force even more patients and disabled people to become clients in private business groups of health and rehabilitation.

            Health units, that will remain public, will operate like businesses and a small portion of the expenses will be paid by the social security funds and the rest by the patients. Depending on the profits these units will have, either they will continue to operate or they will close after some time. That is why the government promotes the deduction of a part of the pension, the long-time patients and the people with mental illnesses take, as a contribution to the payment of public units where they are nursed.

            The cost of 5€ for a visit to the doctors in public hospitals, Health Centers and recently in the hospitals of IKA (Social Security Institution), which entered the public sector, are a foretaste of what will to come.

            The new cuts in the state expenditures on public health by 1 billion 300 million euros in 2011 and additional 350 million euros every year until 2015 announced by the government in the name of “tidying” and of the control of the “waste”, will have tragic consequences for the poor popular strata. It will especially attack the unemployed people, the uninsured people and women who have increased needs for health services. The popular family either will continue to pay even more, with an increase of the social security contributions, or will be forced to cut health tests, treatments, medicines and technical aids, because these will not be covered by the social security funds and the families will not be able to pay.

Ø    The government says that the all-day-long operation of the public hospitals and the creation of the National Organization for Health Care Benefits (EOPPY) are for the benefit of the people.

They deceive people: The all-day-long operation of public hospitals (evening clinics) is paid mainly by the patients. The EOPPY will only provide the minimum services, unified for all the insured people. It will extend the cuts in medicines, health tests and treatments. It will increase the payments by the patients.

Ø    They say that the pharmaceutical expenses are high and the social security funds can not afford to pay for them.

But they hide that the cost of medicines is defined by the pharmaceutical companies, which continue to have high profitability. The state reduces its participation in the pharmaceutical expenses and increases the participation of the insured people. The insured people are forced to pay 100% of the cost in thousands of medicines widely available that are out from the list and are no longer compensated by the social security funds. They even abolish for the cancer patients and all the long-time patients the zero or the small participation they used to have for their medicines.

            Workers and employees, small-scale tradesmen, poor farmers, women and youth of the popular families, you must not consent, you must reject this policy that raises a mortgage on our health to overcome the crisis today and to bring development tomorrow, by leveling our rights and making the plutocracy even more powerful. 

          No sacrifice for the plutocracy. The oligarchy must pay the crisis.

            We must all together, the class-oriented forces within the labor movement through PAME, the radical coalitions within tradesmen – craftsmen through PASEVE, within farmers through PASY, within students through