"New 'More Doctors' program is here to stay and become the standard of healthcare in Brazil", says Lula

247 - President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva stated during the launch ceremony of the New Mais Médicos on Friday (14) that the new version of the program "is here to stay definitively and become a standard of healthcare in this country." "The objective of Mais Médicos is to bring decent healthcare to the most remote corners of this country and to the largest neglected periphery, where citizens have the right to be properly attended to by healthcare professionals, be it nurses, nursing assistants, or doctors. And we know that it is not easy for people to accept going to work in the remote areas of this country," said Lula.

"After the implementation of Mais Médicos, people began to become politicized and aware. Many times, representative entities of the medical profession say, 'There is no need to train more doctors because there are already plenty.' It's true, there are many doctors, sometimes even in excess, on Avenida Paulista, in Copacabana, in Boa Viagem. But go to the periphery and see how many doctors are missing. In any periphery, even here in Brasília. It's not enough to have doctors; they need to be where the people are, and not wait for the people to come to where the doctor is," he emphasized.

According to the president, "this new version of Mais Médicos is here to stay definitively and become a standard of healthcare in this country. We have to learn that it is not something of Nísia [Trindade, Minister of Health] or President Lula. It belongs to all of us. Because if it's not like that, it ends."

Lula also indirectly criticized the dismantling of the program by the government of Jair Bolsonaro (PL) by stating, "When Padilha [former Minister of Health Alexandre Padilha] created Mais Médicos, I never imagined that someone would be capable of putting an end to it. It was something so important for Brazilian society that I didn't imagine that a president or any minister could simply say, 'This program will no longer happen. There are too many communists working in the periphery of this country. We will end Mais Médicos,' without saying what they would put in its place."

Now, according to Lula, "the return of Mais Médicos is like if we had planted a jabuticaba tree, someone came when the branches were full of jabuticabas, shook it, and all the jabuticabas fell, and now we are announcing that we are putting each jabuticaba back in its place, so that Brazilian society can savor it."

"This act today is actually the affirmation that in this country, definitively and forever, the money allocated to healthcare cannot be seen as an expense but must be seen as an investment. Why? Because in Brazil, we need to decide what is an expense and what is an investment. Everything that is social is considered an expense. And often, when it is discussed that budget cuts need to be made, they always try to cut precisely from social programs. Poor people represent a lot, and everything that is allocated for them is also a significant amount. But if you look at the number of people, it is very little money to take care of a lot of people," he emphasized.

The Mais Médicos Para o Brasil program, which recruits healthcare professionals to work throughout the country, will cost R$ 712 million this year. In total, 15,000 new positions will be opened for Brazilian and foreign doctors in 2023, which, according to the government, will ensure "access to healthcare for more than 96 million" people.