Austria Sends Medicine For The Uninsured

An assistance caravan with medicine and paramedical material arrived from Austria to the Elpis Hospital in Athens. The medicine is for the uninsured, who lost their health care insurance along with their jobs. “We have received five tons of medicine so far,” the Director of the Elpis Hospital, Theodoros Giannaros, said.

The explosive growth of unemployment has deprived thousands of Greeks from health care, with many people not having the money to buy even an aspirin.

Social Health Centers established in many municipalities with the initiative of a lot of individuals are doing beneficial work, but they are not enough, as uninsured people are continuously increasing.

The Elpis Hospital, in cooperation with the Austrian organization, Griechenlandhifle (Help in Greece), has been looking after uninsured people among us for a long time. “If a patient with cancer comes to the hospital, we cannot tell him to find a job first and then come to be taken care of,” the hospital’s director, Theodoros Giannaros, said.

Griechenlandhifle started sending assistance to Greece at the beginning of 2013 and the medicine is offered by multinational pharmaceutical companies.

Elpis Hospital receives medicine from Austria twice a month. The hospital has already received five tons of medicine and paramedical material with gauze, catheters, syringes, cotton, gloves and other equipment necessary for the safe operation of surgeries.

Maria Arkouli

Source: Greek Reporter