Reykjavík Grapevine - 16.03.2018, Page 56

L IF E , T R AV EL & EN T ER TA INMEN T IN ICEL A ND
Issue 04 × 2018
Mar 16th – Apr 06th
www.grapevine.is

LAST WORDS
Where has our
healthcare
gone?
Words: Alice Demurtas
Say you live in Iceland and you’re on mini-
mum wage. More than half of your wage
goes into your rent every month. One day
you wake up and you’re covered in painful
red cysts. Crying, you try to make an ap-
pointment; it’s urgent, but you have to wait
two days before you get one. As you walk in,
you pay $15. If you can’t make it, you can try
your luck at the after-hours shift: it’s $30
now, please.
After waiting for hours, you finally get in.
The doctor thinks it’s just an allergic reac-
tion so he gives you some antihistamines:
it’s another $50, thank you very much. Days
go by and the cysts don’t get better. They’re
itchy, painful and terrifying. Two more trips
to the public medical centre, a different anti-
histamine and some blood tests and another
$100 have gone down the drain. The doctor
has also made an appointment for you at a
dermatologist so they can check the cysts.
Finally, at the fourth trip to the centre, a
young doctor sighs as soon as he sees you:
“allergy?” he says. “My dear, it’s clear you’ve
got adult chicken pox!” Well, at least your
sick days are paid for—but only if you have
another $50 for a medical certificate to take
to your employer.
Six months later, while you’re on holiday,
you get a call: “we just wanted to remind you
about the dermatologist appointment that
you booked.” Yes, six months ago.
This was three years ago. Since then, the
hospital has been taken over by mould, while
entire wings have been closed due to the
lack of staff. There aren’t enough nursing
homes in Iceland, which means that the
elderly permanently live in our hospitals.
The emergency room is packed. You can end
up spending two days there, sharing a bath-
room with ten other people because there
are no extra beds. When public institutions
begin asking for endless amounts of money
that we don’t have to cure diseases we don’t
choose to contract, the question is no longer
“When will this stop.” It’s now “Will it ever
get any better?”
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