The authorities will be able to use "the legal instrument of secondment" of medical staff in the medical units involved in the anti-COVID fight, said on Tuesday Prime Minister Ludovic Orban.

He was asked, after meetings with representatives of the Sanitas Federation and the Health Solidarity Federation, how the authorities will solve the problem of lack of medical staff recorded at the level of some hospitals in the country on the backdrop of the COVID pandemic.

"You know the answer, it's secondment. The secondment of medical staff that is in other entities, for example, for the Public Health Directorate (DSP) we need generalist doctors, epidemiologists, medics and nurses to be involved in running all the activity of the DSPs. Furthermore, especially in COVID hospitals, in the external sections which are destined for treating patients with light forms we need staff. We appealed to volunteership, here, the answer we received is not at the level of expectations and, as such, we will use the legal instrument of secondment," said Ludovic Orban, at the Health Ministry.

The Prime Minister added that in the discussions with the union representatives in Healthcare there was also the matter of wage benefits for certain medical staff categories, such as "anesthesiologists working in the intensive care units."

"That 50 pct benefit they receive for secondment be additional to the benefit that those in intensive care units receive and, if necessary, we can make this clarification in an emergency ordinance," Orban said.AGERPRES(RO - author: Daniel Florea, editor: Georgiana Tanasescu; EN - author: Razvan-Adrian Pandea, editor: Maria Voican)