WILLEMSTAD - According to the Association of Medical Specialists Curaçao, the current policy of the Minister of Health Suzanne Camelia-Römer is disastrous for healthcare.
The government recently determined that doctors and specialists aged 65 and over should no longer be allowed to treat patients who are insured with the Social Insurance Bank (SVB). According to the association, this leads to the closure of various practices of specialists and therefore longer waiting times.
The medical specialists believe that consultations must be held with actors in the care sector and that this has hardly happened, if at all, in recent years.
"Several of our medical specialists have been working in Curaçao for more than 25 to 30 years and have seen in the last ten years that medical care has become worse as a result of austerity measures and a total lack of consultation with actors in the field," said the Association of Medical Specialists.
“Now specialists are obliged to retire at 65? This as austerity measure? Does this improve healthcare? No, on the contrary; having experienced doctors with a compulsory stop with 65, causes a brain drain, is not cost-effective and will, due to an acute shortage of doctors, endanger the medical care of patients and increase waiting times.”
The medical specialists point out that "primarily financially driven healthcare" is not good. “Let the caregivers make clear what care they can deliver locally and adjust your finances accordingly.”