RIGA — Prime Minister Valdis Dombrovskis promised this week to provide an additional 25 million lati (€35 million) for emergency health care this year. Minister of Finance Einars Repše confirmed later that the funds will indeed be provided.

This financial injection will save Latvian health care sector from complete collapse this year, said Latvian Health and Social Care Employees Union leader Valdis Keris Wednesday morning on the “900 Minutes” television show. But the problem of the insufficient financing is actually only postponed to next year.

There are 20 hospitals in Latvia which provide emergency health care, and until this week the planned state financing for November and December was zero lats. The reason for this is that hospitals had treated more patients this year than the budget constraints allowed.

According to the health ministry the shortage of funds reaches 43 million lats (€60 million). But Keris and also Jevgēnijs Kalējs, Latvian Hospital Association chairman, are satisfied with a lesser support. This will be an impetus for employees in Latvia’s hospitals to not leave their jobs and the country, Kalējs explained to the newspaper Neatkarīgā Rīta Avīze. The unions say all plans about a possible medic strike are called off.

The financing for Latvia’s health care system next year remains a challenge. Minister of Health Baiba Rozentāle is complaining that for the next year only 405 million lats (€571 million) are allocate for health care. This is 165 million lats (€232 million) less than in 2008. Prime Minister Dombrovskis counters this by promising that health care will get at least 3.4 percent of Latvia’s gross domestic product, the same level as for 2009, though with the GDP sliding down the health care budget for 2010 will be smaller regardless.

Meanwhile planned medical operations have not funded by the state since July 2009.  Rozentāle says this will continue into next year. While some would blame Latvian politicians for decisions like this one, Keris points to European Union Commissioner for Economic and Financial Affairs Joaquín Almunia. Keris thinks that European Commission by focusing solely to the budget cuts in Latvia is indirectly violating the principle that European Union decisions should not impair citizens’ rights to high-quality health care.