Parliament does not authorise hospitals to recruit priests

The Verkhovna Rada did not adopt on first reading bill № 4987 on the introduction of pastoral care in health care service. According to UNIAN, only 165 deputies voted in favour of this decision, with the required minimum of 226.

Also, the VR did not support the proposal to send the bill to the relevant committee and the authors for revision, so the bill was denied.

Presenting the bill, Chairman of the Verkhovna Rada Committee on Health Bogomolets (BPP) stressed that the bill proposed to introduce the term "pastoral care" – work of clergy (chaplains), authorized by religious organizations, in health care institutions.

She noted that the bill provides for the activities of the priests who have been specially trained and selected, on a voluntary or public basis. "Therefore, the question regarding the pressure on local budgets is not in on the agenda," added Bogomolets.

She said that they are currently carrying negotiations with Taras Shevchenko National University on the possibility of opening a new Faculty of Pastoral Care for the training of medical, military and prison chaplains. Bogomolets also reported that the bill proposes to grant the right to clergymen (chaplains) to be a member of the commission on bioethics under health institutions." It is these commissions which will also collaborate with the transplant coordinators who will develop the system of transplantation in Ukraine," she said.

People's deputy of Ukraine Vladimir Litvin (the group "Volia naroda (People’s will)" during the discussion of the project noted that it would be reasonable to introduce priests in the Verkhovna Rada to stop "a session of hatred" in the Parliament when MPs remind of the "flock mates, who are divided into certain groups, and the leaders of these flocks are trying to prove a dominant position."

Litvin pointed out that today Ukraine needs laws that will improve the situation in medicine; and voting for the bill in question today shows "our helplessness" in the issue of changes in the industry and its normal funding.