Headline September 08, 2018/ '' 'SWEDEN SO SPECIAL' ''

'' 'SWEDEN SO SPECIAL' ''

*WORLD'S MOST EXPENSIVE HOSPITAL* :..........................

And frustrations peaked this year when it emerged that the bill for Stockholm's over budget state-of-the-art hospital :

NEW KAROLINSKA HOSPITAL would tick in at 61.4 billion kronor [5.8 billion euros, $ 6.7 billion]..........the most expensive hospital in the world.

And yet patients have to be transferred to other overcrowded hospitals because some of the facilities are unusable.

Lose Time : Swedish law stipulates patients should wait no more than 90 days to undergo surgery or see a specialist. Yet every third patient waits longer, according to government figures.

Patients must also see a general practitioner within seven days, the second-longest deadline in Europe after Portugal [115 days].

Yet waiting times vary dramatically across Sweden's 21 counties responsible for financing hospitals.

One dental patient in central Dalarna county told AFP six months passed before his check-up, while emergency room queues at Stockholm's largest hospitals average four hours.

The 2016 nationwide median wait for prostate cancer surgery was 120 days, but 271 days in the northern county of Vasterbotten, official figures show.

Sweden also complains about about not being able to see their own regular general practitioner - and the ensuing lack of continuity - as a growing number of doctors and nurses are temporary hires employed by staffing companies.

Some 80 percent of the healthcare sector is in need of nurses, according to official data. Online services where patients see a doctor via a webcam, have mushroomed as a result.

''Every time you seek help you also see a new doctor.......This makes us lose time on assessments and  follow-ups,'' Heidi Stenmyren, president of the Swedish Medical Association, told AFP.

IN Solleftea, the premier's northern home town with nearly 20,000 residents, the only maternity ward was shut down last year to save money.

With closest maternity ward now 200 kilometres [125 miles]  away,  midwives offer parents-to-be classes on how to  deliver babies in cars - which have since done.

Sweden has the EU's third-highest spending on healthcare - 11 percent share of its GDP - and the  heart attack survival rate is above the OECD average.

''I get worried some times when people disparage Swedish healthcare as if it didn't work at all........It's not black or white,'' Lofven told Swedish television  SVT.

But the number of hospital beds have declined in recent years, as has the average length of stay.

Frustrations peaked this year when it emerged that the bill for Stockholm's over budget state-of-the art New Karolinska Hospital would tick in at 61.4 billion kronors [5.8 billion euros, $6.7 billion] - the most expensive hospital in the world.

And yet patients have had to be transferred to other overcrowded hospitals because some of the facilities are unusable.

Making matters worse, Swedish aging population has growing healthcare needs.

''In only five years, we will have 70,000 more people aged 75 or older ..... and that comes with more frequent illnesses,'' Lofven told AFP.

His Social Democrats have vowed to spend three billion kronor to hire more healthcare staff if re-elected

The opposition Moderates, which governed for two consecutive terms before the Social Democrats took power in 2014, meanwhile want to reintroduce a law that rewards counties for shortening queues.

But critics say this just encourages doctors to prioritize easily-solved cases.

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