Places civil liability in the event of harm to a patient directly on the doctor, and not on the health facility. This is what the signature maneuver amendment seeks to accomplish Micaela Biancofiorewhich was among those reported, and immediately attracted controversy and protests from the medical world. So, “we are going back to the past” says the president of the Federation of National Medical Associations (Fnomceo) Filippo Anelliwhile for the trade unions it was a “disgraceful frontal attack on the category”. Biancofiore defended himself: “My amendments side with doctors and citizens” and invited the white coat unions to “also try to interpret the annoyance of citizens who, unfortunately, remain victims of sensational errors caused by unwary doctors”.
What do the reported amendments do to the maneuver?
The amendment in question stipulates that “health professional practitioners who, in the course of carrying out activities carried out in government or private health or social-health facilities, cause harm to patients, are primarily responsible for their actions through contractual responsibilities”. Health or social-health structures, public or private, are only liable in cases where they “have not guaranteed the organization of adequate health and welfare services” or “have not provided appropriate equipment and supplies to carry out the activity” or even do not have a health permit to carry out the activity. This amendment, at Anelli’s request, “should be withdrawn immediately, as it would take this issue into the past, erasing with one sponge blow all the laws in the last ten laws, turning the clock back to before the Gelli-Bianco Law, which began in 2017.” In this way, he emphasized, “we want to make doctors the main targets of compensation requests, easing the structure”. The risk is “massive movement of doctors and health workers to other countries”.
Criticism of the white coat and defense of modifications
The opinion of the medical union Anaao Assomed and the Cimo-Fesmed Federation is clear: “Even though on the one hand the Government promises criminal protection to guarantee protection and allow doctors and health professionals to work with a minimum of calm, on the other hand they are trying to carry out a very serious coup, trying to destroy the Gelli-Bianco law. We are faced with a shameful amendment, which takes the country back to the era of hunting for doctors”. “Once again they want to target doctors to fulfill the company’s organizational and management responsibilities,” said FP Cgil. Strong criticism of Biancofiore’s amendment also from Noi Moderati, Avs, Italia Viva. In his statement in the evening, Biancofiore clarified his position – underlining that the amendment “benefits both doctors and citizens” – and invited the union to “also try to interpret the annoyance of citizens who, unfortunately, remain victims of sensational errors caused by unwary doctors”. “Fortunately – he said – the minimal part should not affect the credibility and reliability of the majority. Who, for example, has had his healthy kidney removed or one of his legs operated on instead of the other or worse still, operated on unnecessarily, what should our response be? How can the union justify that? The reasonable response – he concluded – for them should be ‘is the responsibility of the hospital where such a tragic error occurred?'”.
