ATHENS – The news was currently dominated by the fact that hundreds of people were being intubated outside of ICU wards in Greece’s hospitals, as well as the fact “that we have become accustomed to the daily loss of people – 80 one day, 100 the next, 120 the next…these are not numbers, they are lives,” main opposition SYRIZA-Progressive Alliance leader Alexis Tsipras said on Thursday in Ioannina.

Also making the headlines, he added, were the reports by the hospital workers’ union federation POEDHN about “special treatment of ‘VIP citizens’ ….as regards the prospect of decent healthcare,” which were rightly being investigated by prosecuting authorities.

“The government must make all the evidence available to justice and make it public. First of all, it has a duty to provide figures regarding the precise number of our fellow citizens that are not in an ICU, all the figures regarding the mortality of people intubated outside of ICUs and to shed full light and dig deep in cases where there may have been prioritisation based on the patient’s status.”

“We are all equal with respect to the right to life…the right to decent healthcare. We have reached this point, of course, because the government of [Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis] underestimated the right to decent care and the right to life. It has done nothing to truly support the national health system and primary healthcare, nothing in comparison with the increased needs during a time of pandemic,” Tsipras added.

He also referred to the economic crisis and the need to continue supporting Greek households and businesses, noting that the 2022 budget “cannot be a budget of the end of the pandemic” but provide support in the face of the health and high prices crises.