Second legal setback in a week for the regional administration. The Court of Administrative Litigation number 3 of Alicante has agreed with the Alicante College of Physicians and has condemned the Generalitat Valenciana for the delay with which they were vaccinated doctors who work in clinics and private centers in the province. The sentence, to which this newspaper has had access, declares the violation of the fundamental right to equality and health of doctors who work in private healthcare and holds the Valencian Government responsible for this violation, “with its inactivity consisting of not vaccinate them, in clear discrimination with private health personnel & rdquor ;.
The ruling declares the right of Official College of Physicians of the province of Alicante to be compensated by the regional administration, in respect of moral damages, with an amount of €10,000. The Generalitat will also have to pay the costs of the judicial process.
In his argument, the judge recalls that the Ministry of Health, when it drew up the first vaccination strategy, marked as the three priority groups to vaccinate the elderly and nursing home workers, front-line health personnel and other health personnel. The difference between public and private staff when it comes to receiving the vaccine, “was artificially created by the Generalidad Valenciana from the moment it (voluntarily or involuntarily) agreed not to vaccinate the toilets who worked in private healthcare, abandoning them to their fate & rdquor ;.
The ruling goes on to explain that the treatment by the Valencian Autonomous Administration “must have been the exact same for health personnel who worked in public health and for those who were performing their duties in private health. Especially when in the vaccination of the first group (residents and health personnel in nursing homes) no distinction was made between those residences belonging to the public sector and those integrated by the private sector”.
Furthermore, he adds, “it was perfectly easy and doable that private health personnel had been vaccinated together with public health personnel, either by the Autonomous Administration itself or the defendant, or by sending batches of vaccine to private health centers (hospitals, mutual societies, polyclinics, to the professional associations in health matters…) ”.
The statement contains very strong arguments towards the regional administration in the treatment received by private doctors. “They were purely and simply ignored by the regional administration, as if they did not exist. It is not that there was a prioritization of public health personnel; is that there was an inexplicable exclusion of private health personnel; especially since the applicable regulations never contemplated this distinction & rdquor ;.
To justify that the vaccines they did not reach the private doctors, the Generalitat alleged lack of dose, something with which the judge also disagrees. “It is absolutely unaffordable that as of February 4, 2021, the Valencian Community had received 182,690 doses of the vaccine and not a single one of them went to the private health sector & rdquor ;.
This court ruling is added to the issued by another court in Alicante condemning the Ministry of Health for the lack of protection with which the toilets worked in the first wave. Health will have to compensate 154 doctors in the province with amounts of up to 49,000 euros depending on the seriousness of the consequences of having worked without these measures.