For the sake of clarity about the large-scale manipulation of private healthcare spending, I am giving the numbers for 2019, which speak for themselves:
– 8.3% of GDP total health care expenditures – BGN 9.843 billion, representing BGN 1 425 per person a year;
It includes:
– 4.4% of GDP for public health expenditure – BGN 5.256 billion or BGN 760 per person;
– 3.9% of GDP for private health care expenditure – BGN 4.587 billion or $ 665 per person.
It can be seen that public funds for 2019 cover only 53.4% of health needs and private funds, i.e. with additional payments – the remaining 46.6% (Eurostat data, published in the EU Health Report in January 2020).
The allocation of the private BGN 4.587 billion or 46.6% of the total cost is as follows:
– For outpatient care – BGN 229 million;
– For dental care – BGN 73 million;
– For medicines – BGN 3.955 billion
The big deception is that pharma – sector successfully manages to hide behind medical and dental care while the population helplessly reiterates that it co-pays a lot. There are complement payments, of course, but mostly for medicines and the numbers quoted above show the real size of pharma players appetite. In 2017 I put a finger into the wasps’ nest and was allegedly made responsible for exerting pressure by the BDA Director. Three years later I was acquitted at three sets of proceedings but no one bothers to remember that the attack was initiated by the head of the specialized institution for control over the drug sector (IDA) and was implemented by the prosecution and the media.
Well, who doesn’t care, shall pay. I’ll not sympathize with complainings.
Apropo, after Asena Stoimenova resigned from the IDA due to conflict with the parliament (that's how far her self-oblivion reached), Minister Kiril Ananiev personally took her to the Ministry of Health as an adviser in his political cabinet.
And after Dr. Dechev has sounded the alarm on the medication problem, it should be clear that it is not the NHIF that defines the rules of the game, but the MH. And a mark-up of 700% on a single drug is just an example, the investigation should cover the entire positive drug list, the nomenclature of which obviously includes registered price caps times higher than the cost of medicines sold in Bulgaria. This is the responsibility of the MH, not the hospitals and not the NHIF and control of the drug market is the responsibility of the IDA.
So both authoritative bodies should be blamed for letting the drug mafia benefit from drug discrepancies.
Today Asena Stoimenova is preparing to become chairman of the Bulgarian Pharmaceutical Union – I have no doubt that her lobbies will reward her for her good work in favor of pharmaceutical profits and prosperity on the backs of all the rest.
