At yesterday’s session, the Government of the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina (FBiH) determined and sent to the parliamentary procedure of adoption by an urgent procedure the Proposal of the Law on Financial Consolidation and Restructuring of Public Health Institutions in the FBiH.
”These are health institutions whose founders are municipalities, cantons, FBiH, one or more cantons together, and FBiH in accordance with the Law on Health Care. The law regulates the sources of payment of incurred debts, the procedure, and manner of their settlement on the basis of which financial consolidation is performed, the amount of debt reduction, and other issues related to financial consolidation and restructuring, ” the Public Relations Office of the FBiH Government announced.
Financial consolidation and restructuring are carried out in order to achieve liquidity and solvency of health care institutions and strengthen responsibility in risk management in their operations, in accordance with this and the Law on Financial Operations, and the introduction of new health technologies, as well as increasing the quality and efficiency in the provision of health services.
The procedure of financial consolidation of debts and/or restructuring of health care institutions is initiated by submitting a documented request of the responsible person in the public health care institution that is being consolidated. After assessing the request, the competent Minister of Health, with the prior consent of the competent Minister of Finance, makes a proposal for a decision on financial consolidation and/or restructuring of the health institution, which is considered and adopted by the competent executive power.
It is important to note that the Government of the FBiH will allocate funds (225 million BAM) from the Budget of the FBiH in the next three years (since the entry into force of the law), for the program of fiscal consolidation and/or restructuring of university-clinical hospitals, as well as support the process of restructuring and rehabilitation in cantonal and general hospitals.
The explanation of the new law states that the financial analysis of the business determined that the public health institutions as of December 31st, 2020 recorded a loss in the total amount of about 203.1 million BAM, while the total debt of public health institutions with the same date amounted to 438.7 million BAM.
FBiH Government aims to enable financial consolidation of clinical centers as tertiary health care institutions co-founded by the FBiH, as well as other public health institutions, in order to ensure equal, accessible, and quality health care and health services for all citizens of the FBiH. It was the pandemic that showed the importance of health care institutions of the secondary level of health care, which, in parallel with the clinical centers, bore a heavy burden.
E.Dz.
Source: BHRT
