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Filippa Reinfeldt. Photo: Peter Knutson
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The famous child doctor Hugo Lagercrantz criticised in a debate article in Dagens Nyheter yesterday the situation for the child hospital care in Stockholm. He even advice parents with children who have for example heart diseases to move to Lund or Gothenburg. The local politicians say his picture is wrong.
According to Lagercrantz, the number of hospital beds for children in Stockholm will be reduced substantially when Astrid Lindgren’s children’s hospital moves to the new Karolinska hospital in Solna north of Stockholm in 2011. He writes that the number of hospital beds for children are already only half as many in Stockholm as in some other districts in Sweden, in proportion to the population.
Filippa Reinfeldt, the municipal commissionaire for hospitals and medical care (and also the wife of the Prime Minister) says however to Swedish radio that there are no plans of closing Astrid Lindgren’s Children’s Hospital and that she doesn’t know where Lagercrantz got that information from. She also says that all kind of treatment does not necessarily have to be available everywhere in the country. So it is logical that some of the treatment for very complicated heart diseases for children is not available in Stockholm. Reinfeldt claims that the medical care in Stockholm is among the best in the country, both when it comes to quality and low costs.
Stefan Engqvist, president of Karolinska hospital, says to Swedish radio that the premises where Astrid Lindgren’s Children’s Hospital is now will be closed, but the beds will be moved to the new Karolinska hospital. It will however have around 150 beds less than the present hospital. That means there will be a reduction of hospital beds, but it will not only affect the children, but it will most likely affect them to a certain extent.
Karolinska hospital. Photo: Wikimedia
Many people believe, and Stefan Engqvist stress it as well, that the number of hospital beds in Stockholm need to increase during the coming decade since the many people born in the 40ies are getting older and more people moves in to the region. There are currently no new hospitals planned, the reduction of beds at Krolinska is a step in the opposite direction.
(Dagens Nyheter and Swedish Radio)
Facts: Astrid Lindgren’s Children Hospital was opened in 1998. It is part of Karolinska Hospital, one of the major public hospitals in Stockholm, but has its own premises. It is the major hospital for children in Stockholm. They treat everything from cancer to minor surgery.
Karolinska hospital in Solna in one of the biggest hospitals in Europe with around 1600 beds and a highly specialised research. In 2011 the activity will move to new premises, the new Karolinska hospital.
Fight over new hospital