The Ministry of Health owes around 900,000 euros to the Humanitarian Association of Volunteer Firefighters of Pyrenees, in the municipality of Santarém, for the transport of non-urgent patients, one of the largest debts in the entire country.
The information was presented on the afternoon of Thursday, July 11, by the president of the Portuguese Firefighters Association (LBP), António Nunes, who was in the Council of the Republic, more specifically in the Committee on Constitutional Affairs, Rights and Freedoms. Freedoms and Guarantees, where he revealed that the Ministry of Health owes firefighters across the country more than 28 million euros for the transport of non-urgent patients.
“No one can resist a situation like this,” said the association’s president, also aware that the National Emergency and Civil Protection Authority has “numerous debts” to firefighters that it has not paid. Specify the amount.
“We can only have a strong and qualified fire department if there is no more than 28 million euros in health debt, if the National Emergency Institute allocates the 150 missing ambulances to fire departments, and if the permanent funding for humanitarian fire associations for 2025 includes an amount of around 46.6 million euros,” he said.
It is worth noting that at the end of January of this year, the Burns Fire Department won the public tender for the transport of patients from the Santarém District Hospital for the year 2024, for a value of 1.6 million euros, after having also been contracted in a direct modification for the same purpose. service (January and February) for an additional 318 thousand euros.
In 2023, the company also signed patient transport contracts worth more than one million euros with the Santarém District Hospital, currently integrated into the Local Health Unit of Liseria do Tejo.
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