Leros Doctors Denounce Delays in Patient Transfers from Refugee Facility

The EITHEL doctors' union denounced what it described as repeated and unacceptable bureaucratic delays and practical obstacles affecting refugee and migrant patients who need to be transferred from Leros Hospital to tertiary care for further diagnosis and treatment.

In a statement, the union said medical staff repeatedly faced problems unrelated to their clinical responsibilities, including delays in issuing travel permits, unclear areas of responsibility and the absence of an organised system to cover tickets and escorts.

It alleged that in some cases doctors had paid a patient's ferry ticket from their own pocket when a transfer was made on a scheduled passenger service with a medical escort.

The union criticised private groups and companies contracted to provide primary healthcare at refugee and migrant facilities, saying that substantial European funding had not produced even the basic arrangements required for the safe and immediate transfer of a patient needing specialist hospital care.

It also criticised the European Union and successive governments over policies that, it said, had created detention facilities on Aegean islands for people displaced by poverty, military intervention and war.

According to the statement, billions of euros had been distributed in the name of managing migration while private companies and contractors profited from the needs of refugees and migrants, and public health services remained understaffed and without the resources they required.

The union argued that commercialising healthcare and transferring critical services to private contractors did not serve patients' needs. It said health workers were being asked to cover organisational and even financial gaps while companies received public funding.

It described a dangerous situation in which an urgent patient transfer could depend on bureaucratic approval, disputes over contractual responsibility and uncertainty about who would pay for the ticket.

The union said the transfer of a hospital patient to a higher-level medical unit must not depend on bureaucracy, ticket costs or the personal intervention of doctors and other staff.

It placed responsibility on both the private companies providing healthcare in the camp and the facility's management for failing to establish a clear, immediate and safe patient transfer process. It also criticised governments for maintaining a system in which health workers were expected to fill gaps at personal cost and responsibility.

The statement stressed that refugee and migrant patients have the same right as every patient to timely, safe and free access to diagnosis, treatment and transfer. It said their lives could not be treated as a cost and healthcare could not be run according to commercial profit and contractor management.

The union's demands

• A permanent and clear process for transferring refugee and migrant patients from Leros Hospital when higher-level care is required.
• Full and immediate payment of all patient and escort travel costs, with no financial burden on doctors or other staff.
• Direct coordination between the hospital, the camp administration and state services so that valuable time is not lost.
• An end to shifting responsibility on to medical staff.
• Substantial strengthening of the public health system and an end to outsourcing critical services to private companies and contractors.

The union concluded that patients' health must not be sacrificed to bureaucracy, contractor management or state indifference.

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