Government Pumps Another 1,538 Million Euros Into the SNS for Medicines and Exams as This Year's Health Top-Ups Pass 2.7 Billion

The government has authorised another 1,538 million euros for the national health service (SNS) to pay for medicines and diagnostic exams, Público reported on Monday. The newspaper says the top-up was authorised in September, and that more than 2.7 billion euros has now been added to the health budget programme since January, which it reads as a sign of how far the SNS budget sits from what the service actually spends.

For patients, the money does not change what you pay at the pharmacy or the lab. It is budget authority that lets the local health units (ULS, the regional bodies that now run hospitals and health centres together) keep paying the bills behind prescriptions and tests.

Where the money goes

The Finance Ministry's budget office, the Entidade Orçamental, lists every budget change made to the Health Ministry's bodies between July and September. That list, dated 22 October, shows where most of the extra money went:

• About 1,100 million euros added across the ULS budgets for "products sold in private pharmacies". That is the SNS share of reimbursed medicines that patients collect at ordinary community pharmacies.
• About 129 million euros for diagnostic exams and tests (meios complementares de diagnóstico), and about 134 million euros for therapeutic services (meios complementares de terapêutica).
• 959.7 million euros in extra State money for the Central Administration of the Health System (ACSS), the body that funds the ULS.

Across the whole quarter, the Health Ministry's autonomous bodies had about 3,391 million euros added to their budgets and 544 million cut from other lines. The quarterly list does not break the changes down by month, so it cannot be matched line for line with the 1,538 million euros Público reports.

A pattern of rescues

The top-up comes alongside a separate effort to clear old bills. The September budget execution report shows SNS bodies had paid 1,427.3 million euros of overdue debts by the end of September, after the State put more capital into them, against 199.1 million euros by the same point in 2025. The same report shows why the bills keep growing: SNS spending on pharmaceutical products rose 11.6 percent, medicines sold in pharmacies 8.8 percent (more prescribing and wider reimbursement, it says) and diagnostic and therapeutic services 7.7 percent. We covered those figures in our report on September's public accounts.

Underfunding also eats into investment. In a companion piece, Público reports that health investment has passed 60 percent of what was planned in only five years. The president of the hospital administrators' association told the paper: "When there is underfunding, the first component to suffer is investment."

What it means for you

• The top-up changes budgets, not prices or reimbursement rates, so your share of a reimbursed medicine is unaffected.
• Paying pharmacies and contracted labs on time keeps the money moving that keeps medicines on the shelves and tests available through the SNS.
• Expect more of these top-ups. The SNS account is forecast to close 2027 at minus 2,679 million euros, a figure the Health Minister told MPs last week is a needs estimate rather than a loss; see our report on the 2,679 million euro shortfall.