by Claudio Testuzza
28 APR –
Dear Director,
the perfect examine, produced by Cavicchi in his latest work on healthcare, does not even allow the “ex”, as the author defines those who in the past have carried out roles and functions in that area, to be able to say that something could still be changed now to improve the system.
In the Forum stimulated by the book, many interlocutors made proposals, indicated addresses, planned changes. Even Cavicchi himself draws attention to what can be done. But I believe that all this effort is now useless. Of course, this statement could be justified by the condition that after forty or more years the systems can no longer stand the changes immobile. Epochal changes if we consider all the aspects involving healthcare, just think of the new technologies, and above all of the users who have become more demanding and informed, also thanks to communication tools.
We thought that with the widespread feeling of fear of the pandemic and the recognized commitment of public health structures, the consensus towards the health service would be massive, as indeed happened in the most dramatic months of the disease. But after the dismay and thanksgiving, the citizens found themselves making negative if not often even violent assessments.
The personnel has become an “enemy”, the structures impregnable fortresses to be attacked, the services a requirement to be pursued by the forces of order. The search for alternatives is increasingly strong. And in this the offer of the “private” was an easy game.
Sector that has slowly taken on a role not supplementing but replacing the public health system. It had started some time ago providing optimal services, low rates, avant-garde structures. Thus creating a favorable expectation on the part of the citizens. And for those who could not and cannot afford the prices, the company or category welfare systems, insurance (calmed down until the public system is present) have intervened…. And, then, why not also the “mutuals”?
I am aware that such a categorical affirmation can make many shiver and the writer bewildered. But the affirmation that the “private” overtaking of the public service is increasingly evident is underlined by the many interventions that have taken place in recent years with the dismantling of the NHS, hospitals, the same health professionals and first of all the doctors who did not realize that the world was changing and they remained in the granite certainty of role and function.
Have they realized that the increase in chronic pathologies requires the strengthening of the assistance network in the area and home care? If it is true, as Monsignor Ravasi affirmed (Domenica de The sun 24 hours 19 March) “happiness begins at home” even health care must start from the recognition, especially of elderly people, of their right to continuity of life and care at home. And instead we are supporters, also thanks to the Pnrr, of the structures.
I apologize but these lines of mine are the expression of a serious personal unease which, in a moment of serious health condition and the crisis of the 1978 health reform, as masterfully represented by the book by Ivan Cavicchi, should perhaps prompt us to reconsider what it consists of the right to health and what are the conditions to be able to achieve it.
Claudio Testuzza
April 28, 2023
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