Government draws up plans to increase Okypy revenue

Plans to increase revenue and save costs in the state health services (Okypy) were discussed at an intergovernmental meeting on Friday.

The meeting was attended by President Nikos Christodoulides, Health Minister Popi Kanari, Ministry Undersecretary Christina Yiannaki, and representatives of Okypy, the finance ministry, and other stakeholders.

Speaking after the meeting, Kanari said Okypy had carried out an “analysis of actions” for the purpose of saving costs and increasing revenues, and that they gave a “very detailed explanation regarding many of the issues”.

She added, “the analysis is quite comprehensible.”

The issues, she said, are divided into four key areas: internal actions, external actions, agreements with other organisations, and harmonisation agreements in relation to the private sector.

Regarding next steps, she said “the cooperation of the health and finance ministries is needed to monitor these actions, and therefore a committee will be set up to monitor such things at regular intervals in cooperation with Okypy.”

“We believe we will bring results in a short period of time,” she added.

Additionally, she said such results will be helped by cooperation with the health insurance organisation (HIO).

Okypy general executive director Kypros Stavrides also spoke after the meeting, saying “our goal is to rationalise [Okypy’s] finances and guarantee its economic soundness by putting it on solid foundations.”

He added that Christodoulides had suggested the idea of the formation of new committees to monitor the situation, and said he “gladly accepted it, because we believe we can make Okypy stand out by doing this”.

In addition, he said “specific timelines and financial targets” have been set for Okypy, and progress towards these will be evaluated in later meetings.

“We are optimistic that we will succeed because the organisation is making steady progress,” he added.

At the same time, Kanari spoke about the downgrading of the Limassol general hospital to “category 2”, saying she will hold a meeting on Monday to discuss the issue and find solutions with the help of Okypy.

The meeting will be attended by the hospital’s management, Okypy, and other stakeholders.

Stavrides said Okypy “in no way accepts” the downgrade of the hospital to “category 2”, adding “a big investment is coming to the hospital’s infrastructure, to its equipment, and to its human resources.”

An additional meeting was set to take place between Christodoulides and the HIO on Friday, but Kanari said it had been postponed until either Saturday or Monday as Christodoulides “has limited time”.