As of: February 22, 2024, 10:28 a.m
By: Kai Lorenz
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The authors of the open letter to Federal Health Minister Karl Lauterbach: Frank Niederbühl (Managing Director of the GAP Clinic), Sebastian Kramer (Managing Director of the ZugspitzRegion), Anton Speer (District Administrator GAP), Andrea Jochner-Weiß (District Administrator WM-SOG), Hannes Sörgel (Health RegionPLUS GAP). ), Hans-Jörg Zahler (Chairman of the Health RegionPLUS GAP) and Benedikt Wiedemann (Health RegionPLUS Weilheim-Schongau).
© District Office
In a cross-district “open letter” to Health Minister Prof. Karl Lauterbach and the Bundestag members of the government coalition, the districts of Weilheim-Schongau, Garmisch-Partenkirchen and Landsberg am Lech have launched a political appeal regarding the hospital situation.
The background is the fatal development in health policy, which poses major challenges for hospitals across Bavaria and Germany.
“Due to the structural deficit, many clinics are experiencing financing problems.
In Bavaria the deficit is over 100 million euros per month, and across Germany it is almost 800 million euros per month,” the letter says.
In the open letter, the authors, including District Administrator Andrea Jochner-Weiß (WM-SOG) and District Administrator Anton Speer (GAP), warn of a financial collapse of the clinics.
This development endangers comprehensive health care in the areas mentioned, in which a total of 352,000 people live and which are known for their sometimes highly specialized medical facilities.
Alarm call: Clinic financing on the verge of collapse - districts are calling for urgent measures to secure health care
The precarious situation is caused by a combination of inflation, collective wage increases and rising energy costs, which are not offset by adjustments in the state base case value, an essential element of hospital financing.
This leads to underfunding of the clinics, which could result in the closure of specialist departments or entire clinic locations, which severely affects care in rural regions, according to the letter to the Federal Minister of Health.
The authors of the letter are calling for urgent measures to ensure the economic viability of the clinics and to maintain comprehensive health care close to home.
They criticize the current political approach, which seems to amount to an indirect restructuring of the hospital landscape, and condemn the use of citizens' health as a bargaining chip.
Finally, they appeal to the government to abandon its negative attitude towards sustainable hospital financing and invite a dialogue to provide information about the specific challenges of regional healthcare and to develop joint solutions.