“A brave slap in the Algarve”. This is how the PSD deputy Cristóvão Norte classifies the Government's decision to move towards the construction of a new hospital in Madeira, taken yesterday in the Council of Ministers, when the Algarve has long been waiting for the advance of its Central Hospital.
The social-democrat deputy elected by the Algarve has already criticized, on several occasions, the fact that the new Algarve Central Hospital is not among those that the Government plans to carry out in this legislature. Until 2022, the creation of four new hospitals was announced, in Lisbon, Évora, Seixal and Sintra. Now a fifth is announced.
But, recalled Cristóvão Norte, in 2006, in a technical study commissioned by the Government to define the priorities of new hospitals for the country, the Algarve was in second place, behind Lisbon.
“Then, in 2008, the first stone was laid, there was even more than one ceremony with Prime Minister José Sócrates, but the hospital didn't even see him. The tenders were not concluded, the process stopped in 2009 and, in 2011, suspended, like the other public works, by the troika memorandum. No hospital was built», recalled the PSD deputy.
With the entry of the Government led by António Costa, an investment plan was carried out which included four new hospitals, «three of which were either behind the Algarve or had not even been studied».
“I confronted the minister with the fact and he promptly replied, without remorse, that it was for the next legislature. I didn't settle for the injustice. When investing, the order of priorities had to be respected. There are hospitals that are already advancing», according to Cristóvão Norte.
"Worse, the Stability and Growth Program was known - which deals with Portugal's commitments until 2022 - and there are no longer four, but five hospitals planned," he added.
The Algarve parliamentarian considers that the health minister, "who said he would solve the region's fundamental health problems," is "unprotecting it in all the decisions he takes."
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