Association says vacancies in continued care have been getting worse

A National Association of Continuing Care (ANCC) today warned that the lack of vacancies has been worsening, especially in Lisbon, and challenged the Government to pay a “fair value” to bring back to the network beds that closed.

“The government, if it were interested, could try to recover beds that closed, bring them back into the net, paying a fair amount. It was a way to help solve the problem,” Lusa said the president of the association, José Bourdain, who spoke about the report of the Health Regulatory Authority (ERS), today published by the Public newspaper, which indicates that at the end of last year more than 1,900 people were waiting for a vacancy in continued care.

According to the document, at the end of 2025, the waiting for a place in a Long Duration and Maintenance Unit (ULDM) was more than one year (369 days) in Greater Lisbon. Considering all the answers, 1,937 users were waiting, data that according to the association have long been out of date.

“ Things got worse, especially in Lisbon Tagus Valley,” said José Bourdain, who pointed out improvements only in the North and Center regions.

The data released by ANCC in September indicated that over the past five years they had closed more than 750 beds in the continued care units, 260 of which this year.

The problem got worse this year when many works that had applied for the Recovery and Resilience Plan (PRR) ended up out of the funds of this plan because they had not met the deadlines.

“The government could take advantage of the applications that were approved in the PRR, but that did not advance, and could put money there from the State Budget, Portugal 2030 or money from the game of the Santa Casa da Misericórdia de Lisboa, which has always been and continues to be used for the construction of social equipment in the area of health,” said the responsible, adding: “it is a matter of political will”.

The government had approved a financing line of up to EUR 200 million to ensure the completion of PRR works and projects that were not completed within the deadlines, but José Bourdain says that, with regard to continued care, he is unaware that there has been progress.

“ I have a work of the PRR under these circumstances, which is called cooperative housing. We're building 16 apartments and so far nothing. The government said it was going to pass these works to Portugal 2030, but so far no one has told us strictly nothing ", said.

José Bourdain also warned about the weight of so-called social cases in continued care, remembering that it is not only in hospitals that these cases are.

About two years ago, ANCC presented data indicating that more than 30% of the users who were in continued care were “social cases” that ended up taking up places that could be used by users who are in hospitals with clinical discharge waiting for vacancies.