2023 budget: “The additional spending proposed by Congress will prevent the hiring of more doctors and medical staff,” Betsy Chavez said.

Additional expenses proposed by Congress to be included in Budget Law 2023 will lead to a number of consequences, warned the Chairman of the Council of Ministers, Betsy Chavez Chino. One of the consequences will be the hiring of more medical staff.

Chávez Chino warned that there are 10 additional provisions, equivalent to the extra sols 1,164 million allocated to the contingency reserve, money not provided for in the bill introduced by the executive in August this year.

“Attention to these additional costs will entail various costs provided in the contingency reserve, and mainly the following: continued hiring of former CAS COVID-19 “19 full-time CAS out of 12,347 technicians or 4,566 doctors in the health sector,” he warned.

Parliament also included US$238 billion in contingency investment projects as an “additional specification budget requirement”.

Additional Congressional spending will cause us to neglect other sectors

According to Betsy Chavez, due to the increase in tax collection due to the economic recovery, next year’s budget has been increased in almost all sectors, and in general this is 9% more than was allocated for 2022.

However, “the inclusion of any additional expenses in relation to the amount of income that finances the budget, necessarily implies decline other obligations, therefore, what will affect the previously indicated measures,” Chavez said.

Congress ignored MEF recommendations

According to the minister, Congress received technical proposals from Ministry of Economy and Finance (MEF), but these “were not considered”.

“The MEF team recommended that the Commission establish provisions to allow organizations to make cost-effective budget changes that allow for reallocation of resources,” he said.