“The issue of improving training capacities is essential. And then there are other solutions. We do not neglect the possibility of hiring doctors abroad and if we have real difficulties in training specialists here, we will consider training them in other countries”, said the Minister of Health, Marta Temido.

Still on the possibility of recruiting and training abroad, the minister added that contacts had been established.

“We are making some contacts – it's no secret, it's no reservation – with some countries in order to understand how we can face problems that are system problems with external resources. In the past this has already been done in specific, concrete situations,” she said.

In Portugal, she admitted that she was discussing with the Ordem dos Médicos the increase in training capacity in the country.

“It is up to the Government, with the opinion of the Medical Association, to fix them and we will work together to expand them as much as possible, although we know that in the last competition for specialists there were vacancies that were not filled. Therefore, we also have a problem of attractiveness of medical work, which is not only in the National Health Service (SNS)”, she said, refusing to enter “in discussions” about whether the country has “too many doctors or too few doctors”.