Shorena Kakabadze, Kutaisi
“Georgian people will be grateful to the government if they implement serious reforms in the healthcare system. In several years, we will have reconstructed hospitals where doctors and their patients will feel comfortable,” said the former healthcare minister of Georgia Lado Chipashvili three years ago at the presentation of the general plan on the development of hospital sector. After this statement, process of privatization of hospitals started in Georgia which later ended in failure.
Within the hospital reform, the Ministry of Healthcare of Georgia announced competition for the privatization of 193 medical institutions; 175 of them were located in the regions and 18 in the capital. The state-owned hospitals were assigned to the investors as lots. Based on the agreement, they had to execute the responsibilities within three years and show the result of their work. The agreement was not executed. Today, the situation is the same in most medical institutions except several of them. The government of Georgia is looking for new ways to assign the hospitals to new owners.
Alongside others, personnel of the Kutaisi clinic hospital received information about the recent decision of the government; it caused panic among them. According to the medical personnel, not a single lari has been invested in their hospital for the last years. Although it was purchased by the Georgian-Check Company Block-Georgia together with other hospitals in Kutaisi in 2007, the situation is still very obscure. The medical personnel states they have been in informational vacuum for the last three years; furthermore, even the form of the ownership of the hospital has not been defined yet.
Nikoloz Zivzivadze, doctor at the hospital, candidate of medical science: “We are concerned about urgent situation in the healthcare system. We have not found out the fate of our hospital for 3-4 years; we do not know who the owner is, what is to be done and what has been done. Nobody has seen the plan of the hospital development and nothing has been done for its development. Nobody cares about our opinion. In addition to this disorder, the hospital is ready for the sale. Nobody knows who the new owner will be or what he will do after purchase.”
The fate of the clinic hospital had to be settled on April 17, 2010 but the process was postponed for unknown reasons.
According to the official information, the government of Georgia decided to seize the hospital from the Block-Georgia because the latter did not execute its obligations. It caused concern of the personnel.
The head of the hospital said the information is false and the personnel have nothing to worry about.
“The hospital is still owned by Block-Georgia because the competition fixed for the April 17 was postponed for the end of the month. Finally, the ministry of economic development and prime-minster will decide to sell it or not and who the new owner will be. It is not excluded that only part of the hospital will be sold,” said the head of the hospital Kote Kheladze.
The medical personnel have initiative to purchase the hospital to survive it from final collapse.
Paata Tutberidze, doctor at the hospital: “We have been enduring this situation for many years without complaining and it finally led us to current situation. The entire personnel work hard and are mobilized; however, it impacts neither the development of the hospital nor our salaries. We have endured much disaster and conflicts and today they tell us that the hospital will be sold. We will not let somebody come here and tell us to go wherever we want to go because they are going to open a restaurant instead. We do not want restaurants to be opened instead hospitals. Thus we have initiative to purchase the hospital and work on its development. We want it to be done in compliance with the needs of our colleagues. Nobody should forget that these people have been working here since 1961 and they have worked very well. Simply, the hospital with such a long traditions should not be closed like that.”
This hospital is the only one in the western Georgia which serves urgent patients. The personnel think that Georgian-Check Company could not execute the responsibilities and the promise of the government – renovated hospitals and maximum comfort – remained unrealized.
Kutaisi received only one modern clinic from the program of the Rose Government “110 New Hospitals”. With the support of the Georgian-Check Building Company “Block-Georgia” Kutaisi received the institution equipped in accordance to European standards – Intervention Medicine Center of the Western Georgia.
“Although the idea had many opponents from the very beginning, the job was done and today the clinic is one of the best hospitals in Georgia. Many important operations were done in this hospital which was impossible to be done in other hospitals. The clinic was built because of lack of high-technology medical service. It was necessary to build similar hospital in the western Georgia,” said the director of the Intervention Medicine Center Kakha Nuralidze.
Today, the Western Georgia has this center. Thus, there is no doubt that the privatization process of the hospitals in Kutaisi will finish with it. Or it will continue very badly like it happened three years ago. It is fact that the expectation of the population that investors will renovate other hospitals too in Kutaisi was not realized.
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