Hospital patients to be told cost of services

Significant progress has been made on the creation of a system whereby patients at Mater Dei Hospital will be told how much services given to them cost, Social Policy Minister John Dalli said this afternoon.

He stressed that this did not mean that patients would be charged for services.

He said that over the past year, services at Mater Dei Hospital had been costed. This, he said, would be a measure to make the people more aware of the cost of healthcare and how much they were paying for it, as taxpayers.

Mr Dalli said sustainability and real access to health services were the key to health policies. Long waiting lists were an injustice he said and the government was addressing them.

He stressed that government and opposition needed to work together, away from political considerations. Politicians could not continue to make wild promises when they were hard pressed to continue to provide what already existed.

He noted that a sustainability analysis of health services in Malta showed a sustainability gap equivalent to 7 per cent of GDP.

The challenge for everyone was to give the best service, fully accessible to everyone, while ensuring sustainability.

At the beginning of his speech, in Parliament during the Budget debate, Mr Dalli thanked all those who had congratulated him on his nomination to the European Commission. He recalled his service in the House of Representatives and said that despite the highs and the lows, were it possible, he would do it again, because there was nothing more satisfying than to lead reforms which the country needed and which the people were now appreciating.