During a debate at the Economic Forum, Maciej Miłkowski, Deputy Minister of Health and former Vice-President of the National Health Fund, discussed improving access to affordable treatment. He emphasised that a programme providing free medicines for seniors aged 65+, children (including the uninsured), and pregnant women has been introduced over the last few years.
The availability of innovative medical technologies has also increased over the last decade. ‘Poland has overtaken many countries in terms of access to innovative therapies because we are a very large market and we negotiated hard with pharmaceutical companies’, said Miłkowski. He also pointed out that national cardiology and oncology networks follow guidelines to ensure patients receive uniform standards of treatment nationwide. Looking ahead, he anticipates the next stage of reforming the Polish healthcare system, drawing inspiration from the Netherlands or Denmark.
However, according to Prof. Tadeusz Zielonka, a pulmonologist at the Medical University of Warsaw, treatment availability is actually declining, while an ageing population poses additional challenges. ‘Queues to see a pulmonologist have grown to over a year. Those who can afford it go to a private doctor, so we have the first fundamental problem of inequality’, said the expert. He added that waiting times in private healthcare now mirror those in the public sector a decade ago, attributing the problem to a lack of staff.
In neighbouring countries, the situation varies. The Czech Republic, for instance, is among the top five European nations for access to innovative treatments, though it has faced reluctance from companies who considered its market too small. ‘The European Critical Medicines Act can help in such cases. Of course, everything depends on the willingness of each party, the industry and the EU countries. But the purchasing power of the whole of Europe can make it possible to reach an agreement that would be impossible to negotiate for a country with a population of 10 million’, explained Jakub Dvořáček, Czech Deputy Minister of Health.
The healthcare situation is surprisingly poor in Slovakia, where many patients must rely on donations for treatment, especially for innovative therapies. ‘We have a gap in access to modern medicines; we have 47 innovative medicines out of 173, or 27%’, stated Peter Stachura, a Slovak MP and member of the Slovak National Council. Another significant problem is the delay between the approval of medicines and their actual availability for treatment, which at almost 800 days, is nearly seven months longer than the EU average. This clearly sets the situation in Slovakia apart from that of other countries in the region.
