Turkish military faces new front as Health Ministry usurps medical system
Turkey has transplanted its military medical system into civilian life in the Health Ministry.
The Turkish government is following through on its radical decision to totally dismantle the military medical network of about 900 doctors and more than 4,000 military nurses and paramedical personnel.
Under the state-of-emergency decree issued July 31, two weeks after an attempted coup, the 125-year-old Gulhane Military Medical Academy (GATA) in Ankara and 33 other military hospitals in different parts of Turkey were transferred to the jurisdiction of the civilian Ministry of Health. The medical needs of the Turkish Armed Forces (TSK) will be handled by the civilian medical system.
The transfer inevitably created a battlefront of discord between the military high command and civilian politicians, generating angry debates in the public sphere and also between civilian and military elites.
The debate in the public sphere was triggered by reports that a specialist sergeant who had suffered serious burns Sept. 6 had died. The sergeant, part of the Euphrates Shield military intervention against the Islamic State (IS) in Syria, was said to have died because he was not evacuated from the Gaziantep Public Hospital to GATA's highly specialized burn unit. Reports claiming the sergeant had died because of incompetence in the civilian medical system spread like wildfire on social media. The reports added that the civilian system has been experiencing serious problems in prioritizing TSK casualties from clashes with the Kurdistan Workers Party and IS, thus hurting TSK morale and motivation.
