4th Czech health minister resigns since start of pandemic

PRAGUE (AP) — The Czech Republic on Tuesday lost its fourth health minister since the coronavirus pandemic struck last year.

Prime Minister Andrej Babis said that the current office-holder Petr Arenberger called him in Brussels, where Babis is attending a summit of European Union leaders to announce his resignation.

Arenberger, the director of Prague’s University Hospital Vinohrady, was only sworn in by President Milos Zeman on April 7.

He has been recently under fire from the media due to alleged irregularities in his tax returns. He declared he owned more assets and had a higher income after he became a government minister than in the preceding years.

It also emerged that he was renting one of his undeclared properties to the university hospital. That deal was signed before he was appointed its director.

Babis said Arenberger and his family were under pressure and “that's the main reason” for the resignation, Babis said.

Babis said he planned to reappoint Adam Vojtech, who was health minister when the pandemic hit the country in March 2020, to the post.

Arenberger took office after his predecessor, Jan Blatny, was fired over his handling of the pandemic, including imposing strict conditions for the use of experimental drugs to treat COVID-19 patients and refusal to accept Russia’s Sputnik V vaccine, which has not been approved the European Union’s drug regulator.

Blatny had taken over the job on Oct. 29 to replace epidemiologist Roman Prymula, who was dismissed after he was photographed visiting a restaurant that should have been closed as part of the country’s restrictive measures.

Prymula had replaced Vojtech in the post on Sept. 21, to enable a different approach to the pandemic amid surging infections.

Infections are falling in the Czech Republic. The...