The goal of the government is that general practitioners should create practice partnerships, there should be no vacant practices in Hungary, and the standard of local primary care should increase, Prime Minister Viktor Orbán said in a video message posted on Saturday, after the meetings of the task forces in charge of the fight against the coronavirus epidemic.

In the video posted on Facebook, the Prime Minister highlighted that a rise in infections has characterised the past two weeks, and is also likely to characterise the coming weeks in line with international trends.

They heard projections extending to the end of October, according to which the required number of hospital beds are available and the deployment of staff is ongoing. Regarding the latter, he observed that so far 106 physicians and 170 nurses have been transferred to other institutions, but if necessary these numbers will increase.

He highlighted that they heard a separate report about the status of the consultations between the Hungarian Chamber of Doctors and the Operational Group, while next week negotiations will be held about the new rules relating to general practitioners.

“Our goal is that general practitioners should create practice partnerships, there should be no vacant practices in Hungary, and the standard of local primary care should increase,” Mr Orbán said, adding that the government will create the financial conditions necessary for this.

The Prime Minister said, upon the conclusion of this phase of work, they will ask the Chamber of Doctors and the Operational Group to conduct talks seeking to clarify the relationship between private health care and public health care.

The Prime Minister said the autumn school break will be between 23 and 31 October as normal, while at the borders everything is in order.

(Cabinet Office of the Prime Minister/MTI)