Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki on the free medicines programme: today, we have adopted a very positive change in the programme for virtually all Polish people
10.07.2023
The free medicines programme is now expanded. People over 65 years old as well as children and young people up to the age of 18 will benefit from the new measure. People over 75 years old have already been taking advantage of free prescription drugs since 2016. Now, the programme will be available to a larger numer of Polish women and men - for a total of around 16 million people. This is another element of the government's social policy. The expansion of the programme would not have been possible without the a changes in public finances, thanks to which more money goes into the state budget.
- It all started with repearing the leaky as a colander budget. This enabled us to solve many problems. We were able to develop programmes in the field of health care, programmes that were implemented rather timidly at the beginning, but then, we spread our wings more and more widely - stressed the head of the Polish government.
Expansion of the free medicines programme
Today, the Council of Ministers has adopted a draft that extends access to free medicines. The new groups that will benefit from the programme are:
- people over 65 years of age;
- children and young people up to the age of 18.
This means another 11.5 million people entitled to receive free medicines.
We are also expanding the list of free of charge products. Those are medicines, medical devices and foodstuffs for special nutritional uses.
- It is clear that we care about the youngest generation, which is our future, but we also care about those who have worked for our present: our mothers, our fathers, our grandfathers, our grandmothers. This iseveryday care that consists of something very, very specific - so that the elderly do not worry whether they can afford to buy a medicine or not – stressed Prime Minister Morawiecki.
Medicines 75+ programme
We take care of the health of the elderly. In the period from 2016 to April 2023, we spent more than PLN 4.6 billion on the Medicines 75+ programme. This is the amount left in the pockets of seniors. In 2022 alone, seniors received 76 million free packages of medicines, foodstuffs for special nutritional purposes and medical devices.
The list of free medicines currently includes 2046 items. This is almost half of all reimbursed medicines. The new list, which also includes medicines for children and young people, will be announced by the Minister of Health.
- We want that day-to-day concern about being able to buy the prescription drugs , to give way to more beautiful emotions, the positive emotions. So that every grandmother and grandfather could worry a little less whether they can afford to buy the prescription drugs or not. We are expanding the programme to include over 4,000 medicines - announced the Prime Minister.
