Thomas Fatôme, general director of the National Health Insurance Fund (CNAM), expressed concern on Sunday in the newspaper Les Échos about the cost of covering sick leave for private sector employees for Social Security, and said he wanted to strengthen controls.
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“There are cheaters everywhere, among our colleagues, among our patients, but it is extremely marginal”reacts Dr Jean-Christophe Nogrette, deputy general secretary of MG France (French union of general practitioners), guest of franceinfo this Monday, September 9. According to him, all the sick leave certificates issued are “justified”, “the complacent judgments represent the thickness of the line”while the Health Insurance Fund is demanding accounts from 7,000 general practitioners after a slippage of one billion euros this year out of a total of 16 billion.
He attributes the jump in sick leave this year to “chronic diseases that are increasing because the population is aging, because salaried workers are getting older”explains the doctor from Haute-Vienne. “It’s not by hitting doctors, hitting patients with waiting days, with checks” that the public authorities will manage to control the increase, according to the deputy general secretary of MG France.
“We need to re-discuss what ‘too much’ is.”adds the doctor. “The policeman is brandishing his baton, but prevention through the study of working conditions in the company is in its infancy.”
To the new Prime Minister, who has made health a priority, Dr. Nogrette responds that we should not wait “miracle”. But he asks that “the money” be put “where there is need”. “We expect that the health of the most fragile, the elderly, people with chronic illnesses can be the national health priority.”