On World Health Day, public services unions in Europe are sounding the alarm over a region-wide health emergency – with a quarter of people in the European Union unable to access health care in 2025. The crisis coincides with postponements to the EU Health Workforce Crisis Plan by the European Parliament, warned the European Federation of Public Services Unions (EPSU) on April 7.
The confederation emphasized several problems faced by patients as a result of austerity policies and inadequate investment in public healthcare systems, the most prominent being extended waiting times. “Delays affect 62% of those seeking specialist care, rising to 81% for those in need of mental health support,” EPSU said.
As observed in many countries in this region and beyond, extended waiting times are unequivocally connected to chronic workforce shortages in the health sector. Yet current government and EU plans fail to recognize the seriousness of the situation, with nurses, paramedics, doctors, and other health workers bearing the brunt of low pay and high workload.
In addition, EPSU warned, patients are also facing access problems due to unavailability of tests and treatments – as a result of underinvestment in public infrastructure – and financial obstacles linked to the privatization of health services.
“Behind these figures lies a systemic problem: chronic staff shortages, years of austerity, and the growing privatization of health systems,” EPSU’s General Secretary Jan Willem Goudriaan said on World Health Day. “When one in four Europeans cannot access care, the system isn’t failing, it’s collapsing.”
Read more: Austerity linked to over 1 million preventable deaths in EU
To address the crisis, the confederation warns, the EU and its members must alter their course – allocating more resources to public health systems to reach safe staffing thresholds and valuing the contribution of all health workers – a note of particular importance as tendencies to exclude some groups of workers from sector plans are reported. “From doctors to paramedics, from receptionists to cleaners, every worker is a vital link in the chain of ensuring quality care,” Adam Rogalewski, EPSU’s Health and Social Services Policy Officer, said. “You cannot pick one group, support only them, and expect the whole system to function.”
For years, EPSU has insisted on EU-wide measures that would strengthen health systems by investing more in the public sector and expanding the workforce. Only last year, the confederation launched its own proposal for a health workforce crisis plan, based on improving wages and working conditions, recognizing healthcare as a public good, and reversing commercialization in this sector, among other things.
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