Dark everywhere, deaf everywhere, what will it be, or the dispute over health money in the parliamentary budget debate

On Thursday, deputies debated the draft budget and health spending was part of the debate. - The year 2026 will be another year of growth in health spending. In total, they will reach 248 billion zlotys. This is more than PLN 25 billion more than in 2025. Among the aforementioned expenditures were secured, among others, higher funding by PLN 100 million for the in vitro program and funding for the helpline, Finance Minister Andrzej Domanski said. Representatives of the coalition clubs also spoke about the record spending. - When Law and Justice was handing over power, health care expenditures amounted to PLN 170 billion. When we are in power, they amount to 250 billion zlotys. That's 80 billion zlotys more for citizens, so that health care works efficiently, well, better," argued Tomasz Trela (Left). It wasn't long before he had to wait for a retort from a former club colleague, because Adrian Zandberg (Razem) didn't leave a dry thread on the budget, and treated health spending particularly harshly. - This is not just a budget that turns its back on the future. This is also a budget that could be called a book of withdrawn promises. I remember vividly how everyone who was going for a change in 2023 promised that we would finally start investing seriously in public health care and shorten the queues," he said. Zandberg reminded that one cannot flip-flop on sums. - These are not dry numbers, because this is the last delivery room in the Bieszczady Mountains, which you will abolish in a moment. These are patients who are finding out in hospitals, in provincial cities, that they will not be able to participate in drug programs, because there is simply no enrollment in drug programs," he pointed out.

- Dark everywhere, deaf everywhere, what will it be? - decried Patryk Wicher (Law and Justice). - Dark because there is no certainty about what health facilities can expect next year, he warned. And he appealed to the ruling coalition: - Give 8 percent of GDP to health care, then you can say that this is your success.

Wicher said that the government did not go beyond the minimum framework set by the cap-and-trade law passed under the Law and Justice Party, and the record that Andrzej Domanski and coalition partners referred to was the statutory minimum. - Not a penny more has been added, but still 23 billion zlotys will be missing. - This is forgery and fraud, it is disloyal to your subordinates, who are the hospital directors," he added, addressing the Finance Minister. He called it a forgery to arrange a budget that assumes in advance that money will be missing.

The Law and Justice MP went a step further, saying that the reference of health spending to GDP from two years ago should disappear from the law, because in real terms we are currently spending less than 6 percent of GDP on health. - We should talk about something more today, we should recognize that 8 percent of GDP should be allocated to health care," he said.