The inspiration for the invitation to Cannobio by the mayor Gianmaria Minazzi was the show at the Nuovo theater by the «Nuova lime» company of Casale Monferrato. Federico Riboldithe regional health councilor in the Cirio bis council, picked him up and on Saturday evening he was in the town of Alto Verbano. The link between Cannobio and Casale Monferrato, of which Riboldi was mayor for five years, is due to an illustrious fellow citizen: Germano Zaccheo from Cannobio, who was bishop of the diocese in the province of Alessandria from 1995 to 2007, the year of his sudden death. The proceeds from Saturday’s theater evening were donated to the Medical Center coordinated by Antonio Lillo, who is also president of the Vco’s order of doctors and dentists.
Twenty years of experience
So before going to applaud the actors of his city, Riboldi went to get to know the clinic which is in fact the first “health home” in Piedmont. More than twenty years ago it was the first experimentation of group medicine in Piedmont, which in order to be activated had to rely on a private non-profit legal entity.
The Active Community Foundation was specifically established, who took the spaces on loan from the municipal administration, where family doctors (today four and soon to be three again due to a postponed retirement) receive patients, taking turns in the care of the structure, where three are also on duty nurses and four secretaries. With a three-year agreement signed with the ASL Vco, the health company pays the medical center almost one hundred thousand a year for the services it carries out on its behalf.
«These are the blood samples which, after the suspension due to the pandemic, we have recently managed to resume also in Oggebbio and Cannero Riviera – explains the doctor Antonio Lillo -. We then take care of a Cup for booking visits and exams connected with the regional system, of the payment of tickets and we make spaces and instruments available to specialists affiliated with the ASL”.
The request made during the visit to councilor Riboldi was summarized by the mayor of Cannobio Gianmaria Minazzi: «Management costs have grown – he explains – and we cannot rely on donations, which in the past have allowed us to implement our medical center with equipment and new technologies”.
Transfers to be adjusted
To maintain the level of services to the population of the Alto Verbano unchanged, it is essential – this is the message delivered to the regional councilor – that the transfer of the ASL be adjusted.
Riboldi – accompanied by Angelo Tandurella from Dome, one of the representatives of Fratelli d’Italia in a province with the party secretariat under commissionerate – has undertaken to return to Cannobio on Saturday 26 October.
Next visit to the Rsa
The president of the RSA Opera pia Uccelli Ambra Ferrari also asked him to visit the health-care residence, with an Alzheimer’s centre, with 104 places, but which in the post-pandemic period had to reduce them to 92 due to difficulties in recruiting staff.
Some rooms in the facility have been made available to nurses and social and healthcare workers who come from away. However, the offer of accommodation as an incentive to move is not enough in a context of maximum proximity to the border with Switzerland, which continues to attract – with much higher salaries – staff for its clinics and nursing homes.
