Filenews 17 July 2025 - by Marilena Panagi
The risk of the creation of waiting lists for surgical procedures within the GHS is visible, warn the Federation of Employers and Industrialists and the Pancyprian Association of Private Hospitals, with the placement taking place at a time when, as we are informed, the Ministry of Health has already begun to carry out checks concerning, among other things, the compliance of hospitals with the legislation governing their operation and staffing.
"The shortage of nurses forces a reduction in the available beds", the president of PASIN Marios Karaiskakis told "F", while the president of OEB Giorgos Pantelidis stressed that "the problem with the shortage of nurses can no longer be managed. Hospitals must be able to employ foreign nurses in order to first cover the immediate needs, which are already great, and then to be able to cover the needs that are expected to arise with the new hospitals, which, as is well known, will operate in Cyprus in the coming period".
"We must first recognize the fact that our legislation is one of the strictest applied within the EU in terms of the ratio of nurses to beds in hospitals. In addition, we need to study practices in other countries to reduce the problem. For example, it is the requirement and obligation to know the Greek language. A practice that is also followed in other countries is the employment of nurses who do not know the official language in positions that do not require communication with the patient, such as inside operating rooms or in closed intensive care units."
Ways, said Mr. Pantelidis, "exist, but we must be open to dialogue and certainly escape from the obstacles that have been put forward in front of us so far. In Cyprus, there are nursing schools that are attended by foreign students and somehow we have to make use of them."
As OEB, he continued, "we can commit that when there are Cypriot nurses unemployed, we will employ them and we will release foreign nurses. However, we cannot continue to operate with today's data because quite simply the proportions provided for by the legislation cannot be respected and our hospitals are one step away from the closure of beds".
"We must also reiterate that there is also the phenomenon that Cypriot nurses leave private hospitals with great ease when the OCYPY proceeds with new recruitments. As a result, public hospitals employ 70% of Cyprus' nurses while covering 30% of the total turnover of inpatient care".
PASIN: "We are already in the middle of five, hospitals are in danger"
Quite intense in his statements to "F" was also the president of PASIN Marios Karaiskakis. "We are not one step away from the closure of beds, nor on the sidewalk. We are in the middle of five ", he said characteristically and warned that "if decisions are not taken in the coming weeks, if our hospitals are not able to hire foreign nurses, since at the moment there are no Cypriot nurses available for employment, then we will certainly book beds so that we can operate according to the legislation".
"When beds are booked in hospital departments," he explained, "then fewer patients will be served per twenty-four hours. This means that some people will be put on hold and in the end we will create waiting lists in inpatient care. As a result, patients will pay for it and I don't think there is anyone who wants us to reach this point."
"There are ways to deal with the problem, as long as there is a will to free ourselves from what is in force and implemented today," said the president of PASIN.
PASIN, he added, "has discussed the problem with the Ministry of Health and with the Minister himself. In addition to modernising legislation and adjusting the proportions to be in line with today's realities, there are other measures that could be taken. As hospitals, we are certainly not going to endanger any patient, but there is no possibility, it is impossible, to cover the existing needs without new regulations."
"However, we in Cyprus can also follow the practices of other countries. We can employ nurses who do not know the Greek language from the beginning of their employment and assign them tasks that do not need to come into direct contact with a patient. We can apply a ratio of nurses who know the Greek language and nurses who do not, so that there is no gap in communication with patients. But we have to make a decision and do something very soon," Mr. Karaiskakis concluded.
"There is not a single unemployed nurse"
The statement of the Minister of Health, Michalis Damianos, in the Parliament (Parliamentary Committee on Human Rights) a fortnight ago was typical of the situation. "At the moment there is not a single Cypriot nurse unemployed," said Michalis Damianou, adding that "following a campaign by the Ministry, the number of students admitted to nursing schools this year has increased, and those who graduate from nursing schools are immediately admitted to hospitals because the needs are great. We had recorded a series of measures that we could take, we have done our study as a Ministry. We run into the Greek language and some arguments put forward by trade unionists. The problem exists and for some time now, as a Ministry, we have taken some decisions on this issue."
The situation in Cyprus, as far as nursing staff is concerned, was also included in the latest European report on the health sector "Health in the EU at a glance", which was published at the beginning of the year.
"In terms of the number of nurses, Cyprus has one of the lowest ratios in the EU with 6 nurses per 1,000 inhabitants. In the same category as Cyprus are Greece (last place), Poland, Bulgaria and Latvia. The EU average is 8 nurses per 1,000 inhabitants," the report said.
However, the shortage of nurses is also reflected in the low ratio of hospital beds in relation to the population. The Commission's latest report on Cyprus, published earlier this week, in the Health chapter, stated that the number of hospital beds in Cyprus is low, standing at 295 per 100,000 inhabitants, compared to an average of 444 beds in the EU.
