Albufeira mayor Desidério Silva met with the Deputy Secretary of State to Health Minister Fernando Leal da Costa, on Tuesday, to discuss changes aimed at improving the conditions of health services in that municipality. One of the proposals presented by the mayor was the creation of a health unit that works exclusively as a 24-hour emergency.
The mayor of Albufeira said, in statements to the Sul Informação, which proposed «the transfer of land, with XNUMX square meters, located at the entrance to the city, next to the Health Centre», for the construction of this equipment, in order to improve the response to the population's needs.
Despite not having had a concrete answer, Desidério Silva left the meeting this Tuesday with the assurance that the hypothesis would be studied. "I put on the table the various issues related to health and the Secretary of State was receptive and interested in studying these situations," added Desidério Silva.
The tutelage, in articulation with the Regional Health Administration of the Algarve, will evaluate the proposals and the costs involved in this solution. And the mayor of Albufeira used the meeting to explain the need to resize the current Family Health Unit and the consequences of the shortage of doctors and nurses in the county, especially in summer, when the population increases sixfold.
After hearing the representatives of the Nurses Union, Desidério Silva drew attention to the shortage of nurses in the municipality, which has been affecting the operation of the Health Center extensions in the parishes of Olhos de Água, Guia, Paderne and Ferreiras, to the point of closing them at certain times of the week. This is because the five nurses are not enough to guarantee the response to the needs of registered users, who already number around 51 thousand.
Desidério Silva did not pass up the opportunity to also emphasize the importance of maintaining the Emergency and Rehabilitation Medical Vehicle, having shown that he was opposed to any possibility of it being withdrawn from Albufeira.
«Albufeira is a municipality that, in many matters, has to be analyzed differently than usual. Here, the statistics have to include the tourist population that is present in the county throughout the year, especially in the summer months», said the mayor.
Therefore, "it is essential that Health offers guarantees to tourists, especially if we want to point batteries to the senior market as one of the ways to mitigate seasonality", justified the mayor, who added that, even though there is a logic of tourist interest, it is also necessary to think about the well-being of the residents.
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