RIO DE JANEIRO, (Reuters) – Brazil’s health ministry promised yesterday to hire nearly 2,500 medical staff in the state of Rio de Janeiro as it scrambles to help local authorities deal with a funding crisis that has left hospitals under-staffed and ill equipped.
Eight months before the Olympics are due to unfold in Rio, fallout from what is turning into the country’s worst financial crisis in a century is hitting public services. In December, the state governor declared a state of emergency as money ran out and hospitals cut services or closed units.
Alberto Beltrame, a senior health ministry official assigned to help the state, held a crisis meeting in Rio on Thursday to beef up resources at federal hospitals over-run with patients due to lack of equipment and staff at state hospitals.
Beltrame told reporters afterwards that federal health services in the state would hire over the next 20 days 2,493 staff including 693 doctors and 605 nurses. New staff will be contracted for six months, but the terms can be extended to two years.
The ministry said the measure would cost 130.9 million reais (US$32.3 million) per year in 2016 and 2017.
“It’s a significant increase, equivalent to opening a new hospital in Rio rapidly,” Beltrame said.
For those working in the hospitals, help cannot come fast enough.
