Changing the priority with which about sixty patients were to be operated on, without informing them or the doctors who had determined the maximum deadlines for entering the operating room, with the aim of doctoring the waiting lists. This is what, allegedly, has happened at the Ramón y Cajal Hospital in Madrid. Faced with these facts, the Minister of Health, Mónica García, asked the Community of Madrid to clarify the "apparent alteration of the waiting list data" and demanded guarantees in the control and veracity of the records. The news has set off alarm bells: Could there be more centers modifying the number of people pending an intervention, bearing in mind that for years they have been one of the great challenges of the health system? Could it happen in Catalonia?

A new scandal in the Madrid healthcare system, stifled by years of cuts and privatizations, has once again exposed the shortcomings of the public system in the State capital. Managers of one of the city's major hospitals, the Ramón y Cajal, ordered last year to downgrade the severity of some sixty patients awaiting surgery to improve the status of waiting lists, according to internal documents to which El País has had access . According to the information, two heads of the center made changes to the priority of the operations without assessing the affected patients or consulting the surgeons who had determined the severity of the cases.

In the first three months of this year alone, 2,866 people have died waiting for a dependency benefit in Catalonia. They have died in what is known as limbo, the period between when the application is submitted and the administration assesses, recognizes the degree, and grants the corresponding aid through the individual care plan (PIA). There are 128,000 Catalans in this process (the vast majority of whom are elderly people), who have to wait up to 397 days (13 months) on average due to delays in their file, more than double the 180 days set as a maximum by the state dependency law.

In a context of growing population pressure –in Catalonia with 8 million people, 100,000 new users are added to the medical system each year–, today in our country there are more than 200,000 people waiting for an operation, more than 200,000 awaiting a test, and more than 500,000 queuing for a first visit with a specialist. These figures, which the ARA has accessed, already speak for themselves, but to truly assess the magnitude of the issue, we must look at waiting times.

Faced with a cancer diagnosis, a disease with a poor prognosis, or a highly complex operation, Catalan citizens continue to knock on the door of the public health system, even though the number of people with private insurance grows year after year and a third of the population already has double coverage. This increase in private coverage is due, above all, to the difficulties in accessing certain health services, especially when the care is not urgent and is more focused on prevention and improving quality of life.

In Catalonia, there are more than 300,000 people waiting for an operation, a test, or a specialist visit who are on a list that exceeds the waiting time set by law. Patients who have been waiting for years to go into the operating room or who have to reschedule specialist appointments to repeat diagnostic tests that are no longer valid at the time of the consultation. While urgent care that cannot be delayed is maintained within the deadlines set by law by the Department of Health, visits and tests focused on prevention and improving quality of life are accumulating more and more patients out of schedule.

Around 3,000 Catalan families are waiting to be allocated social housing, but the high demand and limited supply of apartments available to organizations and government agencies mean that waiting lists continue to grow, even though applicants meet the requirements and have received a favorable decision. Until this solution arrives, most families survive by subletting or even staying in social hostels.

Taking the practical driving test can be an ordeal in Catalonia. There are more than 70,000 students on waiting lists, and these figures are on the rise. Although this number corresponds to students who have passed the theoretical exam and does not mean they are ready to take the practical exam, it is an indicator that the system is unable to absorb the current demand. "More students are entering than those who take and pass the exam," says Raül Viladrich, president of the Federation of Driving Schools of Catalonia (FAC).