The Real Emergency: A Government That Plunders Public Health | Column
While the number of doctors leaving the country has surged in the last two years, not even 25 million shekels could be found for transporting interns after shifts. Hundreds of millions were "shaved" from the Ministry of Health budget under the whitewashed title of "civilian emergency expenses." This is not a mistake, it is a policy.
The Israeli healthcare system is bleeding doctors to Western countries and to the USA in particular. In recent days, we received further evidence of this in a report by the Tax Authority, which analyzed the healthcare sector as one of those where the number of those leaving the country has surged by 100% in the last two years, alongside the high-tech sector. Excellent doctors are leaving for Western countries, where investment is higher and conditions are more reasonable, in contrast to the unbearable burdens placed on the shoulders of medical staff, as highlighted in the latest Ministry of Health burnout report.
Add to this the coordinated campaign in the economic press against doctors and their salaries, which diverts the discussion from the real problem: a state that invests less and demands more. If that were not enough, last week it became clear that this is not only a government that does not invest in health, but also plunders the healthcare system's coffers for political needs, and unfortunately, no one is stopping it.
The Supreme Court rightly blocked the looting of the public purse. However, in the same breath, it also approved the transfer of hundreds of millions of shekels under the whitewashed title of "civilian emergency expenses." In practice, some of these funds were taken from the healthcare system's budget, the very system that is already stretched to the limit of its capacity. About 600 million shekels were deducted from the Ministry of Health's budget. The official explanation is a "reserve," but in fact, it is a fiction, as there are no reserves in Israel's public healthcare system. There is chronic underfunding, a shortage of manpower, and unbearable queues.
Dangerous Erosion of the System
International data is clear: Israel invests less in health than most OECD countries, about 7.6% of GDP compared to about 9.3% on average. Expenditure per capita is also lower, as is the number of nurses and hospital beds. In simple words: Israel achieves not-bad results despite the low investment, not because of it. This is not efficiency, but a dangerous erosion of a public system.
The absurdity is fully revealed when examining budgetary priorities. A request for parallel funding by the Ministry of Health for the transport of interns after shifts, totaling only 25 million shekels — beyond the amount already allocated for this in the last collective agreement with the Israel Medical Association — is rejected on the grounds that there is no budget. At the same time, hundreds of millions of shekels are suddenly "discovered" as an unutilized reserve and directed to coalition needs.
There is no shortage of examples: at the Medical Center in Nahariya, the intake of medical staff is being delayed due to a deficit of about 50 million shekels, the Soroka Hospital still stands in ruins following the Iranian missile strike, and medical staff are worn to the bone, while the Treasury pulls out ten times as much for other needs. Furthermore, to create a less severe picture, the issue of queues is managed by creating a statistical illusion: official waiting times for surgeries are measured only from the moment a referral for surgery has been received, and not from the moment the patient tries to reach the specialist doctor. The long months of waiting for an initial meeting are simply erased from the data.
"They are robbing the health budget to fund coalition priorities. There is no 'reserve' in the healthcare system. There is an immediate and urgent need: to shorten queues, to strengthen the periphery, to add positions, and to protect medical staff. Every shekel deducted from this system is translated directly into damage to service, further burnout, and risk to human life."
And politics? Silent. Public health is not a central issue for any party. There is no competition over the quality of the healthcare system or for the role of the next Minister of Health. There is no long-term vision, no willingness to deal with the depth of the crisis. Instead, the health budget is perceived as a convenient source for cuts.
Things must be said sharply: this is not a mistake, it is a policy. The Supreme Court has already intervened once to stop damage to the public purse. It must intervene here too, because this time the purse is the healthcare system. And the price is not theoretical, it is immediate, and it is paid in human lives.
Dr. Zeev Feldman, Chairman of the Israel State Doctors Organization.
