With the ruling Radical Left SYRIZA-led coalition ignoring pleas from doctors and hospitals to add staff, a 48-year-old mother of two from the western Greece town of Thesprotia after falling ill because there was no doctor available, the clinic was closed, and no ambulance.

The woman, whose name was not given, went to the Margariti Health Center in her town but it closed early. It was 50 meters from her home, said Kathimerini. There was no report on the nature of her illness.

The union of public hospital workers POEDIN said that “they could have saved the woman if the health center had been open, as her medical history was known.”

Instead, she had to be taken to the town of Igoumenitsa, 13.6 miles away, that had dispatched an ambulance, but POEDIN said it was too late.