The “Aeromedicine Medicial Center” joint-stock company belongs to the Civil Aviation Chief Administration. The state has a share-holding and the company has been proposed to be privatized durign the National Assembly’s fiscal year 2005-2007. The “Physiotherapeutic” institute was also being privatized a couple of months ago, but it was then taken out of the list. Today, the “Aeromedicine” company privatization is on the “agenda” and the National Assembly has assigned to privatize the company as soon as possible.
What does “Aeromedicine” really do and is it really worth privatizing it? As of today, this company is the only company in Armenia which has the right to study and treat the disorders of aviation specialists; disorders that are associated with flight. This means that no other medical institution can give a summary of the staff member’s health status. The company has a license given by the Ministry of Health and a certificate from the International Aviation Committee. The doctors at the company are certified aviation doctors. On top of all this, the UN plans on training the doctors this year. All this gives the “Aerodoctor” a “monopoly”.
“Right now, there is no competition, but it is possible that we may have competitors in the future,” says owner of the company Lilya Ghazaryan.
The aeromedicine cemter examines the health of pilots, the staff and officers yearly and based on the summary, the medical center determines whether or not they have the right to be involved in organizing flights. In case a staff member has a disorder, “Aeromedicine” also treats the patient. Even airport drivers and all officers serving food are also examined. All pilots and drivers take an exam before getting on the plane and that exam helps give a total picture of the health status for the day.
“Our goal is to keep our staff healthy, prevent the spread of diseases and treat the patients. If we see that the illness can’t be treated, then that person will no longer work for the company,” says L. Ghazaryan. The company has medicial centers in all airports of Armenia.
The medical examinations are free of charge for employees. So, how does “Aeromedicine” get its income since it is not financed by the state? The company has contracts with all airlines of Armenia and those airlines pay for the treatments. The airports take care of the expenses for treating airport staff. This is how “Aeromedicine” mainly takes care of its expenses, but it also serves the people living in the villages nearby (the villagers pay a certain amount as they do in other clinics).
L. Ghazaryan did not wish to talk about the privatization issue, however, she did say that she is satisfied with the work being done.
“We have enough technological equipment and we have not had any problems with this to this day. I don’t really have any outlooks in case the company is privatized because the staff may change tomorrow. It all depends on how many airplanes we serve. It’s obvious that the more airplanes there are, the more money we will make. I think everything will be fine if it goes on like this,” says. L. Ghazaryan. Things are really not that bad. As a matter of fact, according to statistics, the company got a 82 mllion 700 thousand dram profit in 2005.
“We get profit, but in 2004 the court recognized “Armenian Airlines” bankrupt and the latter owed us 56 million drams. That debt was not included and business didn’t go well that year,” says L. Ghazaryan. However, she believes that if all goes well, they will progress and the company will get more profit. Based on all this, we can say that the owner of “Aeromedicine” is not interested in privatization.
What does the Civil Aviation Chief Admnistration have to say about this? The latter doesn’t think that it is the right time to privatize the company. The adminisration staff believes that if the company’s property and building are privatized, then it is quite possible that the state will have problems with the medical examinations of the staff working on the planes.