The law on minimum salaries in health care, amended in July, guarantees full-time staff an average 24 percent increase in the lowest salaries. However, the new valuation of benefits, which was supposed to cover the cost of the increases and rising inflation, proved insufficient. Some hospitals, especially district hospitals, cannot afford to pay the increased salaries. Hospitals that are struggling to implement minimum wage increases have been promised support by the Health Minister in the form of the so-called “minimum wage”. restructuring instrument. The problem is that this support will only be possible until June 2023. That is, in a few months we can expect situations in which hospitals will be in debt even more.
Hospitals are already counting not only money for employee raises, but also next year’s bills. According to facility directors from across the country, they are facing huge increases in their electricity bills. Bids submitted in tenders to supply electricity to hospitals are
With fee increases of as much as 400 and 500 percent.
The Ministry of State Assets said in late September that it wants to present solutions to protect local governments and sensitive institutions from drastic increases in energy prices. The draft assumptions for the bill call for the introduction of a maximum energy price of PLN 618.24/MWh, a 40 percent increase over the average tariff approved by the President of the Energy Regulatory Authority. The money for such support would come from a special levy on companies’ windfall profits for 2022, including energy companies.
MAP wants the draft assumptions to be considered as a matter of urgency, without inter-ministerial agreements, public consultations and opinions from at least the Joint Commission of Government and Local Self-Government.
Facility executives also point out that as electricity prices rise, they face rising costs for fuel, heating and feeding patients. It is also becoming increasingly difficult to plan or complete renovations already underway, as the cost of materials and construction work is also rising.
Backlogs of wages for laboratory services, cleaning, catering and medicines are growing. Hospitals pay for it in part. One of the biggest increases is in gas. Oxygen has to be paid for by 63 percent. more than last year.
We also don’t hear in any of the Health Minister’s statements about increasing valuations in connection with the
with inflation for services referred to pediatric hospitals. As you know, these are not flat-rate funded benefits, so they are not covered by the price-per-point increase.
Despite nearly doubling hospital expenditures, total debt ratios, as well as maturing liabilities, have increased.
Specification of quarters | Total value of liabilities (in PLN million) | The value of due liabilities (in PLN million) |
|---|---|---|
II 2021 | 16 859,5 | 2 068,9 |
II 2022 | 17 859,9 | 2 165,5 |
Data source: Ministry of Health: https://www.gov.pl/web/zdrowie/zadluzenie-spzoz
Questions that arise include:
How long can hospitals manage to function under such funding conditions?
Will there be a risk of cancellation of scheduled appointments and the return of emergency work?
Will directors eventually face a choice of who to pay?
Unfortunately, there is a real risk of insolvency and late payments to suppliers of goods or services. Already noticeable is the extended payment period for invoices.
Nettle’s analysis indicates that the accounts receivable collection cycle is lengthening. In 2021, the average payment term was 134 days. At the end of the third quarter of 2022
In some units it is already 186 days. Further forecasts, unfortunately, are not optimistic.
