“The country faces situations such as the most recent one, where a woman lost her baby after a two-week journey through five hospitals in Greater Lisbon, and at the penultimate hospital, she refused to go home”, the Observatory stated in a communiqué.
“Finally, Santa Maria Hospital admitted her and induced labor; however, the baby did not survive. This woman’s complaints over these two weeks were not heard or addressed”, highlighted the document.
The OVO considered the case as indicative of the “breakdown” of the National Health Service (SNS) and questioned the coordination between local health units and the personal care that leaves women dependent on a telephone line “poorly structured and incapable” of ensuring proper pregnancy monitoring.
According to the observatory, the government is following a policy of “quick fixes and opacity.” The country, it argued, urgently needs to restore “security, dignity, and humanity in the SNS.”
OVO PT demanded that the Ministry of Health fulfill “all the country’s needs” and guarantee access to healthcare for everyone in Portugal.
“We hereby publicly demand the resignation of the Minister of Health, Ana Paula Martins, for failing to build consensus and for showing an absolute lack of knowledge on how to resolve the severe issues currently faced by healthcare in Portugal”, the Observatory justified.
“Lisbon and Vale do Tejo have three million people. It is the area with the most emergency closures in the past four years, and compared to 2023, closures increased by more than 40% in 2024, and in 2025 these closures are less reported due to the strategic abandonment of the portal in real data view, which is becoming increasingly sparse,” according to the document.
