Private Investors Fill Gaps in North Macedonia’s Failing Healthcare

These were the latest major investors in North Macedonia's healthcare business, in the 20 years since private healthcare gained momentum in the country.

A look at the histories of the largest investments in health in this period reveals that this business was long dominated by investments by prominent medical professionals like Zan Mitrev or Emil Ugrinovski, by foreign companies, or by the country's wealthiest businessmen, at the top of the Forbes wealth charts, such as Orce Kamchev and Mincho Jordanov.

But this is changing. In the past year or two, smaller investors have entered the sector, including some who have never worked in healthcare or had any medical experience. Despite this, they have chosen to invest capital in private healthcare anyway.

This all indicates that the healthcare business has become a field in which all sorts of investors scent potential profits.

"Private healthcare is a very big business that pays off in the short and long term, and it will pay off even more in the future," said Nikola Todorov, North Macedonia's health minister from 2011 to 2017, said.

However, the reasons why this activity has turned into a potential gold mine are not exclusively market-related.

It is the poor state of the public healthcare system that has left gaps for the private sector to fill.

Low levels of investment in public health have left more space for private businesses to occupy, former officials and people involved in the business told BIRN.

The key difference between public and the private healthcare is often not only the quality of service that people receive in one facility or the other; the issue is also whether the service is available at all in the public sector.

Arben Taravari, Todorov's...