Grieķijas aklo salā teju visi iedzīvotāji izrādās redzīgi

Citos reģionos - citas diagnozes. Greek and international organization reports rank public hospitals as one of the most corrupt institutions. According to Transparency International, it is where 42% of bribes are dealt out, more than for taxes (16%). Amounts vary from 30 euros to cut a line to 30,000 euros for certain surgical operations. Athens has grappled with the problem only recently, though cases like Zante’s regularly make headlines: there are the Cephalonia Island amputees, the Thessalonica handicapped, the Viota region asthmatics… Some doctors were collared, like the gynecologists who diagnosed asthma and depression. In Zante, the ophthalmologist is hesitant before he accepts an interview over the phone. Nikos Varzelis says it’s a “political conspiracy” led by the mayor and swears that he wanted to “help the poor, without receiving any money.” Dyonisis Gasparos, the prefect, refuses to comment. In a local newspaper, this urologist, candidate for the right in the legislative elections on June 17, had explained that he “simply signed the certificates sent by the expert.” It is only in Gasparos’ home village of Keri on the southern edge of the island that people start to talk. Here, in the prefect’s stronghold, there are 48 “blind” people for 630 inhabitants. Including the most famous swindler, a taxi driver, in close competition with a bird hunter.

nebt ne visi: 682 people were receiving up to 325 euros in government benefits. Each. According to the World Health Organization, that’s nine times the average in developed countries. “I discovered this anomaly at the start of 2011, when the responsibility to distribute the benefits shifted from the prefecture to the town hall,” says Mayor Bozikis. “I wrote to Athens, but in the central administration they were dragging their feet. I was afraid that they wanted to bury the story, so I made it public.” The control tests ordered by the Health Ministry yielded their results at the end of June, and only fifty or so blind and visually impaired people will get their benefits back. The others will have to pay back past benefits, and risk going to prison. The legal investigation and the testimonies paint the picture of a smoothly running operation that has probably been in place since 1998.

Pie vainas ir debīlie grieķi.