Minister of Health works towards eliminating waiting lists in healthcare system

Minister of Health, Óttar Proppé.

Minister of Health, Óttar Proppé. mbl.is/Kristinn Magnússon

Minister of Health, Óttar Proppé says that he is making a concerted effort to eliminate waiting lists within the Icelandic health care system. The main way to do this is by increased funds and support to the hospitals.

"When we talk about waiting lists we are mostly talking about the wait for what we call optional operations, or that is, operation that are not emergency operations but operations such as eye operations, knee operations, and so forth. These are the operations that tend to go to the back of the line when there's too much pressure on general and emergency services, the Minister said speaking at Parliament yesterday. 

He added that the effort to shorten waiting lists had begun more than a year ago when Parliament made a decision to put a further 840 million ISK for three years in a row into the healthcare system for the purpose of shortening waiting lists.

He added that they are mainly focusing on the National University Hospital in Reykjavik, the Akureyri Hospital, the Akranes Hospital and the West Iceland Healthcare Institute.

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