Gestor bibliográfico Crisis y Salud

Since April 2010, Greece has agreed to an economic memorandum as a consequence of high state debt. This has led to an inexorable financial burden for Greek citizens, which, in turn, has had an adverse impact on health care provision. To begin with, private medical services have become unaffordable for many citizens. Thus, more patients have resorted to the public health care system: utilisation of public inpatient and primary care services rose by 6.2% and 21.9%, respectively, between 2010 and 2011. At the same time, access to treatments is stricter and more controlled, and the state has tried to cut expenses for pharmaceutical products, as reflected in the 23.7% decrease of total health expenditures1. From the patients’ own perspective, self-rated health in Greece has now been reported as deteriorating due to the recent financial crisis2. From the health care providers’ viewpoint, repeated reductions in salaries, reduced nurse-to-patient ratios and rising emergency admissions in the public sector3 have resulted in poorer working conditions. In this context, we will discuss the effects of the Greek economic crisis on issues of health care in diabetes and vascular complications. The magnitude of these effects is not precisely known but it is expected to deteriorate in the near future due to the ongoing financial stagnation.