The law that was adopted by the House on Tuesday, at the initiative of the government, with 122 votes in favor and 31 against, abolishes the mandatory chamber membership of doctors.
The legislation submitted by the Minister of the Interior on Monday and adopted in an exceptional procedure on Tuesday states that medical activities can be carried out even without existing membership in the Hungarian Medical Chamber (MOK). Chamber membership can be terminated voluntarily and at any time.
Péter Takács, the State Secretary responsible for health at the Ministry of the Interior, said in the Parliament about the proposal: it serves to ensure high-level, accessible and safe patient care for everyone. He said,
by obstructing the operation of the new on-call system and thereby endangering the health care of the Hungarian people, the Chamber violates the basic rules of the character of a democratic public body and disregards its own goals.
According to the state secretary, the fact that the chamber openly threatens doctors who do not share the presidency's opinion and participate in regional on-call care is reminiscent of "the darkest communist times". The legislation transfers ongoing and future ethical procedures to the Health Sciences Council, as well as the new code of ethics is created by this organization and approved by the minister responsible for health. In the future, the chamber will only have the right to comment on the code of ethics.
Pursuant to the change, doctors can declare whether they will retain their chamber membership up to the thirtieth day after its entry into force. Those who do not make a declaration will have their membership terminated by operation of law.
A body appointed by the minister responsible for health and higher education acts in the qualification and evaluation of further education. The IOC forms an opinion on management appointments only above its members.
The legislation enters into force on the day following its promulgation.
Source and opening image: origo.hu
Slomó Köves' response to the accusations published in Népszava, regarding the termination of the compulsory association membership of doctors:
civilek.info:
In the "government critic" (meaning: anti-government) press, they are now screaming why did the parliament abolish the institution of compulsory membership only in the case of the Medical Chamber? The answer is quite simple: because the other chambers operate in accordance with their founding goals, and carry out professional and non-political activities. Oh, and he's not blackmailing you, he's threatening your membership. The chamber that still does this is not worthy of representing the given community (in our case, doctors). That's it.
