In Armenia on New Year eve it is better not to get sick, especially for people who are supposed to have medical care within the government order. Citizens who applied to us with complain said that they had been told politely to come next year or pay. According to our data, the state financing for 2013 in many medical institutions has been spent already, and the head doctors gave an unpublished order not to take patients within the government order. Particularly, as NEWS.am Medicine was informed, such document for internal use existed in medical center «Armenia».

In several hospitals of Yerevan we were told, that the government financing for the current year is over already, so some of the patients are sent to other clinics, and those, who can wait, are recorded in the queue, and the hospital will accept them after New Year. We were also assured that urgent patients are accepted in any case, but on what terms, the question remained open.

The Head of the State health agency at the Health Ministry of Armenia Saro Tsaturyan told NEWS.am Medicine, that the ministry knows about the situation, and there are both objective reasons and subjective. The objective reason, according to him, is total lack of government financing, and the subjective reason is failure to comply with the established order of service within the state order. According to his words, medical institutions must properly plan expenditures of funds within the framework of the state order, and evenly distribute the budget by month.