The Minister of Health decided to send an extremely important message for all of Romania at the moment, and this because it brings to the immediate attention of all people one of the most serious problems related to hospitals in Romania, which need major renovations at the moment .
The Minister of Health talks below about the fact that even old hospitals can be renovated, and they can be brought to normal operating conditions, something that of course cannot be achieved very easily, but even so, we are talking about measures that can do a lot good for a very large number of Romanians in the future.
"The average age of hospitals depends on resources. I heard comments "the minister, instead of building hundreds of new hospitals, tells us that we have to rehabilitate dozens of old hospitals". I am not saying that we need to rehabilitate dozens of old hospitals, but where I have no other solution, and I have a space that is decent, and that through renovation, rehabilitation, changing the sanitary installations, can become functional, that meets all quality standards.
I saw this in Bistrita, for example, an extraordinary thing, two old building bodies, 100 years old, perfectly rehabilitated. I'm not saying it's not possible, sometimes it can cost you more to rehabilitate an old one to current standards than to make a new one, but these are decisions you have to make depending on each situation.
There was a lady about 7-10 years ago who said that we must close, demolish all hospitals, I agree. But where do we treat patients? This has to be a process. What we did at the ministry, because we have 67 hospitals out of the 400 at the ministry, and there has never been any evaluation, a policy related to these buildings, what is their physical condition, what investments have been made, and what it has to be done.
Now I have made an assessment of everyone regarding the condition of the buildings and equipment they have, so that we can start, I would like to be able to start, even if with a small amount next year, because of the economic crisis, but we have projects for 5 years, for 10 years, so that these projects are rehabilitated, either the old buildings, or new ones are built.
In Bucharest, we have the CC Iliescu Institute for cardiovascular diseases, an inappropriate, old building, which needs to be totally restructured. They applied, I hope they have the chance, of course we have no way of knowing, because they are objective criteria, not subjective, to be on the list of hospitals eligible for financing through PNRR, and in 2026, in the middle of the year, to have a new hospital there .”
