In a candid interview, Health Minister Adalberto Campos Fernandes has suggested that Portugal’s health service suffers losses through fraud and theft of €900 million a year, or around 10% of the annual budget.
Promising that many cases of fraud will be revealed soon, the minister stated that, "Many are under investigation and, in the coming days, they will naturally come to light," in an interview with Diário de Notícias.
Adalberto Campos Fernandes said he was not going to elaborate on the particular successes he was about to reveal, nor would he be specific about the total estimated loss to the taxpayer from illegal activity in the health service.
What the minister would say is that the police and public investigators had done a good job and that those about to be accused oif theft and corruption would serve as an example to other who were thinking of stealing from the public purse.
The minister said that the new electronic prescription system has helped enormously in the battle against fraud as has the digitalisation of various of admin proceedures.
According to the minister, fraud can eat up 10% of the annual health care budget.
"Now 10% of the health budget is all we would need to have a modern NHS. This would be about €900 million, which would go to rebuild the whole technological platform and to recruit all the staff needed," said Adalberto Campos Fernandes.
