In the town of. Kardzhali held the last regular meeting of the Business Council in the Health Sector

On 12.04.2023 at 15:00 in the town of. The last regular meeting of the Business Council in the health sector in the border regions of Blagoevgrad, Haskovo, Kardzhali and Smolyan was held in Kardzhali, the activity is implemented under the project "Business Council - BC 6275" funded by the INTERREG V/A GREECE-BULGARIA 2014-2020 Programme, Subsidy contract № B6.3a.18/13.04.2021.

The meeting was attended by five representatives of the sector from the border regions of Haskovo, Kardzhali, Blagoevgrad and Smolyan. The meeting was held in the hall of the association "Europe in Dialogue", town of Baskagovo. The meeting was held in Kardzhali. It was technically equipped with multimedia, laptop, printer, microphone(s) and sound system, as well as information boards, banner and presentation materials, according to the requirements of the Communication and Publicity Manual of the Interreg V/A Greece-Bulgaria 2014-2020 Programme. In addition, disinfectants as well as water, coffee and tea were provided to secure the coffee break of the event.

The moderator of the event welcomed all attendees, leaving time for a brief introduction of the new business council members. A few minutes were taken to present the Rules of Procedure of the BS in the health sector.

The topic of today's discussion was the uneven distribution of pharmacies in the country. According to the participants in the meeting, the existing pharmacies in the country are fully sufficient to meet the needs of the population. Unfortunately, however, most of the pharmacies are located in large cities and there are entire municipalities where the population does not have access to pharmaceutical services.

This is also the case in Kardzhali district, where there are many scattered small settlements that are difficult to reach and where there are not only no pharmacies permanently operating, but often no doctors. The situation in which their inhabitants find themselves is literally life-threatening.

Often, the mayors/mayors of the settlements have to procure the medicines needed by the residents of the settlement.

It would be difficult to find a way out of this situation, but a council member presented his idea that could alleviate the situation somewhat, namely, to offer over-the-counter medicines in grocery stores. Of course, this is a measure that will by no means solve the problem, but it will make a large proportion of the local population feel a little better about the situation.

The project management team is committed to the task of bringing local authorities and pharmacists together in a roundtable to discuss the problems in the sector and to share the ideas proposed by the BS.

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