Italy Healthcare Recovery Plan
The pandemic exposed key deficiencies in the resources and infrastructure of the Italian healthcare system. In response, the Italian Government has prepared a Recovery Plan for the healthcare sector to upgrade digital, structural, and technological resources. Valued at EUR 8.6 billion, the plan will fund hospitals directly in two specific areas. The first being technological and digital updates, and the second, technical, professional, digital and management training, scientific research, and technological transfer.
1. Technological and digital update: High-Tech Hospitals
Out of the total budget, about EUR 4 billion will be invested in the technological and digital updating of hospitals. The goal is to replace obsolete medical equipment by mid-2026, which will be completed via the acquisition of 340 CT scans with 128 slice, 190 MRI at 1.5 T, 81 linear accelerators, 937 Fixed X-ray systems, 193 angiographs, 82 gamma camera, 53 gamma camera/CT, 34 PET CT, 295 Mammographs, and 928 echotomographic devices. The total cost of these 3,133 pieces of medical equipment is EUR 1.18 billion, and the procurement is expected to occur at the end of 2024.
| Equipment | Unit cost (Euro) | Quantity | Total |
|---|---|---|---|
| CT SCAN | 530,000 | 340 | 180,200,000 |
| MRI | 914,000 | 190 | 173,660,000 |
| LINEAR ACCELERATOR | 2,000,000 | 81 | 162,000,000 |
| FIXED X-RAY SYSTEM | 247,700 | 937 | 232,079,213 |
| ANGIOGRAPH | 608,000 | 193 | 117,344,000 |
| GAMMA CAMERA | 525,000 | 82 | 43,050,000 |
| GAMMA CAMERA/CT | 793,000 | 53 | 42,029,000 |
| PET CT | 2,403,400 | 34 | 81,715,600 |
| MAMMOGRAPH | 274,500 | 295 | 80,977,500 |
| ECOTOMOGRAPHIC DEVICE | 82,000 | 928 | 76,091,622 |
| TOTAL | 3,133 | 1,189,146,935 |
Additionally, EUR 1.45 billion will be invested in 280 hospitals to improve the digitalization across the facilities to include surgery units, LISS, laboratory information systems, pharmacy services, emergency rooms, triage, drug prescriptions, diagnostics, repository, and scheduling.
Another EUR 1.67 billion will be invested in strengthening the digital infrastructure of the Italian healthcare system. The goal is to have patients and doctors in all regions fully adopt the Electronic Health Record (EHR). In order to achieve this goal, EUR 292 million will be allocated to the Ministry of Health to strengthen the infrastructure and the analytical instruments of the Ministry, to reengineering the new health information system (NSIS) at local level, to build a powerful simulation and prediction model for medium and long- term healthcare scenarios and develop a telemedicine platform. By the end of 2025, the Italian Government hopes to have 85% of general practitioners utilizing the EHR on a regular basis.
The total investment also includes EUR 1.4 billion from 2020 that has already been allocated towards increasing intensive care unit beds (ICUs) by 3,500, increasing sub-intensive care beds by 4,225, renovating 651 emergency rooms, and acquiring 84 new ambulances.
2. Training, scientific research and technological transfer
To improve Italian scientific research, the Government will allocate EUR 524 million towards strengthening the treatment capabilities of centers of excellence in terms of rare diseases as well as promoting technological transfer between new research and businesses.
At the same time, about EUR 737 million will be invested in training general practitioners and healthcare managers, including scholarships for specific training in general medical practice, extraordinary training on hospital infections, management skill training for healthcare managers and 4,200 contracts for medical specialties courses.
US companies interested in connecting with Italian distributors, seeking representation and information on how the U.S. Commercial Service can assist U.S. companies should reach out to kira.migliorini@trade.gov