According to data consulted by Lusa, the number of people who do not have a general and family medicine specialist has been rising steadily since January, rising from 1,564,203 at the beginning of the year to 1,644,809 at the end of May, that is, 80,606 more in those five months.

Around a year ago, in May 2024, 1,602,577 people were without a family doctor, 42,232 fewer than today.

In the last decade, the lowest number of people in this situation was recorded in September 2019, with 641,228 users, around one million fewer than those who were without a family doctor in May of this year.

Conversely, May 2023 was the month in which the most users were registered without a primary health care specialist, with 1,757,747 people.

On Wednesday, the Minister of Health stated that every day, there are more citizens with a family doctor, but admitted that there are regions that are “less protected” and that new users enter the National Health Service (SNS) every day.

“Every day we have more citizens with family doctors. I will repeat: every day we have more citizens with family doctors and the Portuguese, and the citizens know this”, declared Ana Paula Martins, on the sidelines of the bicentennial ceremony of the Faculty of Medicine of the University of Porto.

In the competition that took place recently, of the 389 family doctors who recently completed their training in the specialty of general and family medicine, only 231 chose one of the 585 vacancies available for placement in the local health units (ULS).

There were 585 vacancies, 412 applications were submitted, but only 231 were filled; that is, around 60% of the total vacancies available in the competition remained unfilled, according to data from the Central Administration of the Unified Health System (ACSS).

The ACSS data also indicate that in two ULS, none of the vacancies were filled, such as Alto Alentejo, where the 12 places put up for competition were left unfilled, and Estuário do Tejo, which had 37 vacancies that were left unfilled.