Health: Emmanuel Macron’s announcements to deal with the crisis

Emmanuel Macron, the President of the Republic, sent his wishes to health actors, in particular to hospital and liberal staff, during a trip to the South Francilien Hospital Center (CHSF) in Corbeil-Essonnes (Essonne), this Friday 6 January.

The observation of the crisis in the hospital

“I know the personal and collective exhaustion, this feeling, sometimes, of loss of meaning that has set in and the feeling of going from one crisis to another, of never getting out of this day of endless crisis.”, declared Emmanuel Macron, as a statement of the current crisis which affects the world of health and more particularly hospitals.

On the occasion of his vows, the President of the Republic made several announcements to try to resolve this crisis. One of the major measures is the end of fee-for-service – or T2A – pricing in public and private hospitals. This method of financing health establishments distributes the resources allocated according to the number of procedures and stays they record. “No one can stand for establishments to compete visibly any longer.”, affirmed the President of the Republic. To replace T2A, goal-based pricing is expected to be adopted in the 2024 Social Security budget.

An administrative and medical tandem announced at the hospital

For the hospital sector, the Head of State also announced the appointmentn an administrative and medical tandem at the head of each hospital. “For a very long time, we said it shouldn’t be the caregivers who run the hospital, it should be the administrators, he explained during this press conference. Afterwards, we said “the problem is the administrators who run (…)”. I would like us to be able to (…) put an administrative and medical tandem at the head of our hospitals, a real tandem on the basis of a project“.

According to Jean-Paul Hamon, honorary president of the Federation of Doctors of France, this rebalancing is not the right one: “It’s time for the administration to hand over. It’s time for the caregivers to speak”, he throws into the microphone of Europe 1. For the doctor, these announcements were “a big disappointment”. “The president did not take the measure of the extent of the disaster”he estimated.

A reorganization of working time at the hospital will also be put in place “by June 1“, with a possible revision of the 35 hours. Indeed, the Head of State denounced the”hyper-rigidity“35 hours, in a hospital system that”only works with overtime“. More nurses will also be trained for the hospital.

6,000 new medical assistants recruited

Regarding community medicine, Emmanuel Macron wishes to respond to the request of doctors: to save care time by reducing the administrative burden. For this, the President of the Republic announced the recruitment of 6,000 medical assistants by the end of 2024. Another claim of doctors: the increase in their remuneration. Emmanuel Macron announced that they would be “better paid”, especially when they take on new patients or when they are on call.

“We have 600,000 patients with chronic illnesses who have no attending physicians and that’s a real problem.“, lamented Emmanuel Macron, announcing that they are “will be offered a treating doctor before the end of the year” in the absence of “a treatment team“composed of caregivers from different specialties.

In reaction to all these announcements, some immediately hailed a “clear diagnosis”, a “precise timetable”, “the opening of perspectives”, the “exit from denial”. Others already point to “the absence of quantified commitments”, a “fuzziness on the alternatives” or on the “method” summarizes Le Monde in its article on the subject. One thing is certain: by addressing his wishes to the world of health, Emmanuel Macron has come out of the “deafening silence” – an expression of the Pediatrics Collective – that a large fringe of caregivers has criticized him for weeks.