Nearly seven years, two governments, five health ministers, three different directors and two different presidents at the Health Insurance Organisation (HIO), one professional association, and endless consultation. Patients, most of them children, are still paying out of their own pockets to secure occupational therapy services.
“It’s time to speak with the language of truth,” Charalambos Papadopoulos, secretary of the Federation of Patients’ Associations of Cyprus (OSAK), told Phileleftheros in a pointed tone. He said some parties appear not to want the current situation to change, others believe the matter can remain unresolved indefinitely, and some are simply playing for time because they do not want to get caught up in a dispute that has trapped patients for years, behind what he described as a supposed concern for patients’ interests.
Papadopoulos said it was time for everyone involved to take responsibility, since every deadline had already passed. He stressed this was not a matter of 100 or 200 or 1,000 patients, but thousands of people, each needing occupational therapy for a different reason. He described the situation facing a parent whose child needs occupational therapy, where GHS offers the service only on paper, forcing the family to pay privately for something they should receive free of charge. “For almost seven years, children have gone without the therapy they need,” he said, or been forced to pay for it themselves, because professionals, the HIO and the Health Ministry have failed to reach an agreement.
Papadopoulos said professionals continue to seek as much as they can secure, while the HIO repeatedly submits financial proposals that are rejected, with ongoing disagreements over which services should be included in GHS and how many times the relevant list has since been revised. He said that since last April, OSAK has been waiting for the ministry to review the latest proposal and schedule a new meeting.
He said everyone involved invokes the interest of patients, and questioned whether it serves the interest of patients, the children who need occupational therapy and their families, for a GHS budget to exist while they continue paying privately. He also questioned whether it serves the interest of the thousands of children involved for them to miss school to secure public healthcare services, or to queue for services only available through the public sector via GHS.
Papadopoulos said OSAK had given a deadline of January 2026 last autumn. “We are now in mid-July 2026,” he said, and there has been no update since last April. He said patients continue to pay, struggle, or go without the services they need, adding that in previous years OSAK maintained communication and consultation with all sides and tried to narrow the gap between the HIO and professionals. Despite these efforts, he said the process has once again stalled, with no update and no indication it will be resolved.
Papadopoulos said the Federation will decide on further steps once it receives an update from the Health Ministry on the process, which it has been awaiting for three months. He said that faced with this deadlock, some patient associations are proceeding with the necessary steps to employ occupational therapists directly to provide services through GHS.
Red line
“We cannot accept this delay any longer,” Papadopoulos said. He said the start of occupational therapy services under GHS is essential, and that setting strict timetables for the full integration of these services into the system is a red line for OSAK. He called on every party involved to take responsibility towards patients, saying patients’ interests should not simply be used as a rhetorical line.
A January 9 deadline was set at the end of 2025
Efforts to reach an agreement between the HIO and occupational therapists have continued since 2020, spanning five different health ministers and two governments, during which time the HIO has changed three directors and two presidents.
At the end of 2025, after the issue had drawn strong public attention following statements from professionals outlining their own positions, then-Health Minister Michalis Damianos gave the relevant association a deadline to respond by January 8.
There was renewed activity last April, when the HIO prepared another proposal and presented it to the relevant association, on condition that the Health Ministry would review it and schedule a new meeting between those involved. “Since then, as OSAK we have had no update. The months pass and the situation does not change,” Papadopoulos said.