Trojka's Hospitals for Private Appetites, Not for Treating Citizens

(Patria) - On the agenda of the 23rd session of the Sarajevo Canton Assembly (KS), scheduled for Monday at 10:00 AM, will be, among other things, the Draft Law on the conditions that a Cantonal Hospital must meet.

Member of the Sarajevo Canton Assembly Faruk Selmanović (SDA) told the Patria News Agency (NAP) that behind this proposal is not the promised vision of the "Sarajevo Agreement", but the hitherto patented "triple secret".

- Although at first glance it appears to be a continuation of the transformation process of the General Hospital "Prim. dr. Abdulah Nakaš" into a Cantonal Hospital, a process initiated by a conclusion of the Assembly in 2020, the essence of this law moves towards reorienting citizens' will in service of private interests.

Essentially, instead of transforming the existing General Hospital into a Cantonal Hospital, the Draft Law on the conditions that a Cantonal Hospital must meet creates a basis for something completely different - the establishment of a completely new Cantonal Hospital - emphasizes Selmanović.

He points out that, although the ruling majority, intoxicated by the sweetness of power, will undoubtedly try to explain that "it's not really like that", the facts are relentless.

- The law does not mention the transformation of the existing institution, it does not prescribe specific obligations towards the General Hospital, nor does it provide guarantees that it will become a Cantonal Hospital.

Instead, the law defines the conditions for some hypothetical cantonal hospital that is yet to be established. Where, how, and for whom, remains an apparently open question - notes Selmanović.

Open, but not unclear, adds our interlocutor, because Article 35 of the Law states that the verification of the future cantonal hospital is not carried out according to this law being adopted, but according to the existing federal Law on Health Care and the regulations already prescribed by the Federal Ministry.


Article 35 of the proposed law

- Therefore, even if the law is adopted, it will have no legal force in the process of establishing the hospital. And that ends all illusions about its real purpose.

The question arises: why adopt a law that will not even be applied? The answer is obvious - to create a legal framework, a political smokescreen, for the establishment of a new healthcare institution.

Perhaps even private ones. Perhaps even elite ones. Perhaps located near a Sarajevo Health Center. But in any case, competitive to the General Hospital "Prim. dr. Abdulah Nakaš" - warns Selmanović.

And that is not just an institutional absurdity, he assesses, it is a social danger.

- Because when the state abandons its own institutions, when it hands them over to market competition and leaves them to the mercy of budgetary chaos, patients become hostages of a system that will first impoverish them, and then write them off.

This is a law that does not protect citizens, does not improve the healthcare system, and does not correct injustices. This law protects someone's ambitions. This law creates space for turning health into business, patients into customers, and hospitals into commodities.

There is no common-sense politics here. There is only trading of interests, behind closed doors and far from the sight of those who stand in lines for examinations every day, wait for appointments for diagnostics, fear for therapies and medications - says Selmanović.

This law, he points out, is not an attack only on the General Hospital - it is an attack on the idea of public healthcare.

- If we allow this to happen, then we have already lost what is most important in healthcare: the citizens' trust that their state will treat them when they are in the most difficult situation. And once we lose that faith, no law in the world will bring it back - concludes Selmanović in an interview with NAP.

(D.K.)