The 15th Day of the Sick will be celebrated in Poland in an atmosphere marked by the dramatic crisis of the national health service. The government plans to transfer some 180 million euros to the health service in the next three years. But the sum is only a drop in the ocean of debts accumulated by the service over the years, estimated at approximately one and a half billion euros. In recent days, due to the service’s mountain of debt, the situation of the Oncological Clinic in Wroclaw has become critical; the children being treated there have been deprived of the necessary drugs not only for the continuation of their treatment but also for their very survival. The hospital, in spite of its efficient management, has been forced to transfer the money it needs for the purchase of drugs to creditors. To help the child patients of the Clinic in Wroclaw but also patients in other hospitals, the Primate of Poland, Cardinal Jozef Glemp has appealed to the faithful, asking them to contribute, through Caritas, to help alleviate the situation. The Polish Bishops’ Conference says in a statement: “In the context of the next World Day for the Sick we wish to make a pressing appeal to men and women of good will and especially to the Government and to the local authorities” to “take all the necessary steps without delay to solve this dramatic situation”. The bishops, in the hope that “by uniting our forces we may succeed in overcoming the present crisis”, warn: “Patients cannot be stripped of hope”. Aid for the clinic in Wroclaw has flooded in from all over the country, reaching a sum of 500 million euros in a few days. The difficult situation of the national health service is one of the most crippling legacies of the inefficiency of the Communist regime.
