ZAGREB, February 20, 2020 - Health Minister Vili Beroš said on Thursday that Croatians from the Diamond Princess cruise ship would be returning to Croatia after 14 days of quarantine on the ship on Thursday and Friday, adding that plans were being made for their reception as the coronavirus epidemiological situation on the ship was worse than in China.

Six Croatians spent two weeks in quarantine aboard the Diamond Princess in the Japanese port of Yokohama due to the coronavirus that spread among the passengers.

Noting that plans were being made for the reception of the Croatian nationals, the minister said that the epidemiological situation on the cruise ship was not entirely clear to him.

"Given the current circumstances, we will act a bit differently," he said.

"They will return home in different ways, some will arrive today and some tomorrow," he said.

Asked if the Croatians would be put into quarantine, he said that plans were being made for their reception, stressing that the epidemiological situation on the cruise ship was worse than in China.

"I believe that it is due to the specific circumstances of staying on a vessel and I sincerely hope that that is the only problem," he added.

The Croatian Foreign and European Affairs Ministry said on Wednesday that a Croatian national who had stayed aboard the Diamond Princess as a passenger left the ship on Wednesday, that he was considered healthy and that there were no restrictions on his movement. As for the other five Croatians who are still on the ship as crew members, they continued their stay in quarantine together with other crew members even though they do not exhibit any symptoms of the disease.

540 cases of infection with the novel coronavirus have been identified on the vessel with 3,700 passengers and crew members.

More news about Croatia and coronavirus can be found in the Lifestyle section.

ZAGREB, February 7, 2020 - There is no case of coronavirus detected in Croatia and the Health Ministry and the government acted quickly and adequately when the epidemic emerged in the world and there is no need for panic, Health Minister Vili Beroš said during the cabinet meeting on Thursday.

The coronavirus disease is new and Croatia has to be prepared for all possible scenarios. Caution is needed in treating potential patients coming to the country and the ministry is coordinating and implementing all the measures that are required through its emergency headquarters, Beroš said.

He noted that current information indicates that there are 28,280 people infected with the disease worldwide, 257 being in China. So far there have been 565 fatalities, and all but two have been recorded in China. The disease has been identified in 24 countries.

There have been 28 people in the EU registered with the disease in France, Germany, Finland, Italy, Spain, Sweden, Belgium, and Russia.

Beroš underscored that the characteristics of the disease are not that alarming yet for it to be considered to be an exceptional threat however certain caution is required with potential patients who are coming to Croatia.

"Just upon the outbreak of the epidemic an expert team in the ministry was activated and the emergency team has networked the entire health system, also through telemedicine and video links, and personnel are on call," Beroš said.

All mechanisms in the emergency headquarters have been set into motion and the emergency team will send a notice to all cities and counties of the need to monitor the health situation in their region.

Detailed instructions have been compiled for all health workers how to deal with suspicious cases as well as instructions for border police and health inspectors at the border.

The Civil Aviation Agency has sent instructions to all airlines that come to Croatia and established cooperation between the relevant state institutions.

The Croatian Public Health Institute introduced special health inspection measures on February 2 for all passengers arriving from China or who had been in China within the incubation period of 14 days.

That proved to be a good measure because the very first day the measure was introduced a female passenger was identified who had been Wuhan just 12 days prior to landing in Zagreb, Beroš recalled. She was then advised to remain in quarantine for the next two days at least.

More news about Croatia and coronavirus can be found in the Lifestyle section.

ZAGREB, February 5, 2020 - A certain number of ambulance drivers in Zagreb went on strike on Wednesday, but patients are being transported regularly, the head of the city's Department of Emergency Medical Services, Žarko Rašić, said.

The department asked a court to ban the strike considering that the Healthcare Act does not provide for the possibility of emergency medical services staff organising a strike, Rašić told Hina.

"At the moment, everything is operating normally. All patients have been transported for dialysis treatment and there are no long waits. We have about 15 ZET city transport drivers on call if need be and about 30 staff from other institutions - drivers and nurses who are prepared to step in," Rašić said and added that 31 ambulance crews were on the ground.

No one from the union of ambulance drivers was available this morning for a comment. The union announced on Monday that ambulance crews in Zagreb would go on strike to demand a pay rise so that their monthly wages are equated with those of drivers of emergency medical service vehicles, which would require an additional two million kuna (270 million euro) annually.

The union is demanding that the government adopt a regulation to define job titles and job complexity indices so that ambulance drivers be reinstated with their original index which was reduced when the ambulance service was divested from the emergency medical service in 2011.

Talks were held at the Health Ministry on Tuesday with the leader of the ambulance drivers' union Mišel Majetić, and Minister Vili Beroš offered a compromise regarding job complexity indices.

Beroš said on Wednesday morning that the Department of Emergency Medical Services had asked a court to say whether the strike was lawful and that until the court delivered its ruling it was his duty to see to it that emergency services were operating normally.

More healthcare news can be found in the Lifestyle section.

ZAGREB, February 5, 2020 - Health Minister Vili Beroš said on Tuesday that Croatia would not close its borders over the novel coronavirus as long as there was no such agreement at the European level.

"We are not going to ban people from entering Croatia, but we are going to ask them who they are, where they come from and whether they have any symptoms of the disease," Beroš told a news conference, adding that the Croatian authorities would act in accordance with professional standards for the prevention of an outbreak of this communicable disease.

He also noted that currently there were 27 cases of the coronavirus in Europe, and added that the death rate was about three percent. "This is an even lower rate than in flu cases," he said and called for caution because this was a new type of virus.

Later on Tuesday, it was reported that two young men, who had recently been to Shanghai and had been hospitalised in the eastern town of Vinkovci as one of them had a high body temperature and the other respiratory problems, had not contracted the coronavirus. All the tests were negative in their case.

DAILY UPDATES: Total Croatia News provides LIVE daily updates on the coronavirus epidemic here.

More coronavirus news can be found in the Lifestyle section.

ZAGREB, January 31, 2020 - The 151-seat Croatian parliament on Friday voted for the appointment of Vili Beroš as the new health minister, with 81 votes in favour, 42 against and one abstention.

Upon the voting, the newly appointed minister took oath.

In January 2018 Beroš was appointed an assistant to then Health Minister Milan Kujundžić, who was dismissed a few days ago.

Before taking office, Beros was the head of the Endocranial and Pediatric Surgery Department of Zagreb's Sisters of Charity Hospital, where he started working in 1998.

Since 2012 he has been an associate professor at the Zagreb University Faculty of Education and Rehabilitation Sciences. He is also a vice-president of the Croatian Society for Cerebrovascular and Endovascular Neurosurgery.

After Prime Minister Andrej Plenković said this past Tuesday that he would propose that parliament confirms his nomination of Beroš as the new health minister, Beroš said that he would do his best to advance the health system and would immediately start talks on unpaid overtime with associations representing medical personnel.

More news about Health Ministry can be found in the Politics section.

ZAGREB, January 29, 2020 - Assistant Health Minister Vili Beroš, nominated by Prime Minister Andrej Plenković to succeed the just-dismissed Minister Milan Kujundžić, said on Wednesday morning that later in the day he would enter some changes in his Declaration of Assets, which happened in the last two years.

Beroš told the N1 commercial broadcaster that those changes had happened since he became the assistant minister, explaining that he had refinanced two loans taken in 2008 and 2016 and was now paying them at a more favourable interest rate arranged by the Croatian Medical Chamber for its members.

In 2016, he and his wife borrowed 50,000 euro from Erste Bank and in 2008 they took a loan of 75,550 in euro Addiko Bank.

Beroš also explained that since he became assistant minister, he reduced his activities as a court expert in neurosurgery and some other additional jobs, which had impacted his annual income.

Beroš will therefore meet the Commission's chairwoman, Nataša Novaković, to add those changes to his Declaration of Assets.

The current declaration shows that Beroš and his wife own a property appraised at 1.5 million kuna in the Zagreb suburb of Rudeš, as well as a 50-square-metre flat in the suburb of Vrapče.

He also reports that he has inherited a part of a property in Jelsa on the island of Hvar.

He and his wife possess two cars, one appraised at 75,000 kuna and the other at 120,000 kuna, and he is a co-owner of a speedboat.

The declaration of assets shows that Beroš and his wife, who works in a kindergarten, have managed to save 25,000 euro.

According to Beroš's CV, he was born in Split in 1964, is a university professor and has been employed at the department of neurosurgery of the University Hospital Centre "Sestre Milosrdnice" in Zagreb.

He is a member of the European Association of Neurosurgical Societies Center of Excellence for Neurosurgical Training.

In 1989, he graduated from the University of Zagreb Medical School summa cum laude.

Beroš, a member of the ruling Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ), is the Vice President and founder of the Croatian Society for Cerebrovascular Neurosurgery.

More news about the Ministry of Health can be found in the Politics section.

ZAGREB, January 26, 2020 - Health Minister Milan Kujundžić has said that there is no evidence in the ministry's books about the transactions in the amount of 4.7 million kuna to the Smart Medical company, which is described in media outlets as the firm owned by a former business partner of the Kujundžić family.

Kujundžić thus dismissed speculations about the payment of 4.7 million kuna (635,000 euro) from the health ministry's budget to the Smart Medical, owned by Neven Mrkša, a former business partner of the Kujundžić family and their first-door neighbour, as claimed by the Telegram web portal.

The web portal on Saturday claimed that the transactions had been performed in 2018 and 2019 and that the company had been set up two months after Kujundžić became the minister.

Refuting these media allegations, Kujundžić also says that in any new case of dissemination of false information against him and the ministry, he will be forced to file a defamation lawsuit against providers of fake news.

More news about the Ministry of Health can be found in the Politics section.

ZAGREB, January 22, 2020 - The Conflict of Interest Commission will inspect the information registered on the Declaration of Assets submitted by Health Minister Milan Kujundžić following media reports about his purchase of a house in Zagreb and its value.

"The Commission will launch a procedure to check the information on Minister Kujundžić's declaration of assets and compare that with information that it will request from the authorised institutions - Tax Administration, Land Titles Department and so on," a spokeswoman for the commission, Martina Jurišić told Hina.

If any discrepancy is identified, the commission will request the official to submit his explanation and after that the commission will decide whether there are any grounds to launch proceedings, Jurišić added.

The Telegram news portal reported that Kujundžić registered a lower value for the house he is currently living in than is realistic.

The minister claims that the house is valued at 900,000 kuna even though a loan agreement that the Kujundžić's signed with the PBZ bank in 2010 estimated the value of the house at 2.37 million kuna and later when the loan was rescheduled, the property was appraised at 1.68 million kuna.

Kujundžić did not wish to comment on the Telegram article but said that everything was clear and transparent regarding his house and that he would inform the commission of everything when he is requested to do so.

"I'm obliged by law to answer to the commission, however, there is nothing to hide here, everything is transparent and clear. It is easy to check and see how much my wife and I earned in the past five years, just as it can be seen in my account that my savings increased by 7,000 kuna to 8,000 kuna each month," Kujundžić told Hina.

Telegram on Tuesday reported that Kujundžić's family bought another house in Zagreb late last year, which is owned by his wife Tatjana and that she paid 1.46 million kuna for the property located in the Zagreb suburb of Maksimir. The article however notes that it is not clear from Kujundžić's declaration of assets where the money to purchase that real estate came from.

Kujundžić reacted saying that the transaction was transparent and lawful and that he had informed the commission of the purchase.

Kujundžić noted that the house is estimated at 195,000 euro and that he and his wife bought the house with a loan of 100,000 euro with the PBZ bank, 55,000 euro of their savings at the PBZ bank and 40,000 euro that he borrowed from friends of theirs for which he signed an agreement that was certified by a public notary and that that money was paid directly into the seller's account.

Prime Minister Andrej Plenković, who is currently attending the World Economic Forum in Davos, commented briefly on the entire case and said that he would meet and talk with Kujundžić on Thursday.

"I can't much comment, I believe that he will explain everything," said Plenković.

More news about conflict of interest issues can be found in the Politics section.

ZAGREB, December 11, 2019 - Following a ruling by the Supreme Court that doctors are entitled to higher pay for overtime, Health Minister Milan Kujundžić said on Tuesday he would try together with the HLS physicians' union to find a solution to this issue.

The Supreme Court ruling says that reimbursement to doctors for overtime work should also include compensation for specific work conditions and other benefits, which means that the debt to doctors accrued due to miscalculation of overtime pay is estimated at 1.5 billion kuna (203 million kuna), and so far 4,000 physicians have taken legal action against their employers over this problem.

Several hundred final verdicts have been handed down to date.

The Supreme Court ruling has been applauded by the HLS union and the Croatian Medical Chamber (HLK).

"This is our joint victory in the struggle for doctors' rights," HLK leader Krešimir Luetić said today.

HLS leader Renata Čulinović-Čaić said the ruling confirmed physicians' claims that their overtime pay was miscalculated. Now it is up to the ministry to think and find ways to pay what we have earned, she added.

Kujundžić said that the ministry would try to reach agreement with the HLS on the pace and schedule of payment of that debt. He added that the problem was inherited from the government which was in power in 2013.

More news about the healthcare system can be found in the Lifestyle section.

ZAGREB, November 23, 2019 - The Croatian Medical Chamber (HLK) and the doctors' union (HLS) on Saturday said in a press release that they would launch several actions in December to draw attention to the untenable status of their profession.

The HLK and HLS associations say in a press release that Prime Minister Andrej Plenković and his cabinet are turning a deaf ear to their demands.

In this context they recall that two months ago they asked the premier to hold an urgent meeting with them over "the poor and worrisome situation in the profession of doctors and in the Croatian healthcare system."

They demanded the immediate beginning of the elaboration of the legislation on pay and working hours for physicians.

The two associations today said that they had not received any answer from the premier so far.

"It is irresponsible not only to doctors but also to our patients," they say announcing a news conference for next week.

In September, the HLK, the HLS and the Croatian Doctors' Association adopted a joint statement in which they warned about the more and more deepening staff, financial, infrastructural and organisational crisis in the healthcare system.

More news about the healthcare sector in Croatia can be found in the Lifestyle section.