The state health services organisation (Okypy) keeps posting deficits, its budget continues to grow despite a sharp drop in the admission of patients, and it has lax controls over personnel, MPs heard on Thursday.

Parliamentarians were discussing the findings of the auditor-general from his report on Okypy for 2022.

Auditor-general Andreas Papaconstantinou sounded the alarm, pointing out that even the size of the organisation’s deficits is unclear.

Giving an estimate, he said the deficits range anywhere from €50 million to €150 million a year.

Meantime payroll has reached €1.3 billion.

Papaconstantinou noted that the number of doctors and nurses is increasing at a rate far exceeding the rate of administrative personnel – while at the same time outpatient admissions have declined by 50 per cent and inpatient admissions by 20 per cent.

Elsewhere, the official highlighted poor governance at Okypy. He mentioned the case of two nurses, found to have been moonlighting – working outside the hospital. The two were in cahoots, one covering for the other.

Once discovered, despite the serious offence, they were given a slap on the wrist – deprived of two statutory pay increments.

The Audit Office also flagged a case relating to the posting of a vacancy for the position of doctor, where bizarrely the academic qualifications listed were a master’s degree in political sciences and finance.

For her part, the permanent secretary at the health ministry acknowledged that between 2018 and 2023, the number of outpatients served at Okypy hospitals fell from 1.8 million to 887,000.

Christina Yiannaki additionally conceded shortcomings in timekeeping among personnel, as well as lax controls over foreign travel, advertising expenses and hospitality costs.

The head of the patients federation voiced concern about the trajectory of the national health system (Gesy), especially over the decline in patients.

In remarks to the press after the session of the House audit committee, MP Zacharias Koulias spoke of a “recipe for disaster” for Okypy.

Based on what they had heard, he said, it was only a matter of time before hospitals “collapsed” – meaning financially and organisationally.

“They took the doctors from the hospitals and made them GPs, and so many patients now are being served by personal assistants,” Koulias remarked.

Meantime waiting lists for specialist doctors were too long.