{"id":7482,"date":"2025-10-30T10:02:40","date_gmt":"2025-10-30T10:02:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ofero.news\/?p=7482"},"modified":"2025-10-30T10:02:40","modified_gmt":"2025-10-30T10:02:40","slug":"romania-built-zero-major-burn-treatment-centers-in-10-years-since-the-colectiv-club-fire","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ofero.news\/?p=7482","title":{"rendered":"Romania built zero major burn treatment centers in 10 years since the Colectiv club fire"},"content":{"rendered":"

No burn treatment centers were built in Romania following the 2015 Colectiv club fire<\/a> that killed 65 people, the majority of them from hospital-borne infections, despite numerous promises.<\/p>\n

On the evening of October 30, 2015, several hundred young people were in the Colectiv club in the former Pionierul factory in Bucharest, attending a concert by the rock band Goodbye to Gravity, which was launching its album Mantras of War<\/em>. At 22:32, during the concert, a fire broke out because of fireworks on stage, and the flames spread rapidly within seconds. That night, 27 young people lost their lives, and another 162 were injured and transported to eleven hospitals in Bucharest. In the following weeks, more and more survivors died from hospital-borne infections.<\/p>\n

To this day, Romania\u2019s severely burned patients have a chance to survive only if they are transferred abroad, even though the country theoretically has 34 beds available for treating severe burn victims. However, the necessary equipment is lacking, as made evident by the Bucharest explosion<\/a> earlier this month. A victim with burn injuries was sent, following the blast, to a specialized center in Austria.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Empty Promises<\/h3>\n

In the last two years, Romania has relied on centers in other EU states to treat 26 burn patients.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cI cannot say that Romania can treat any type of burn patient, regardless of the affected area. It cannot. Because it does not have the necessary infrastructure. Any patient who does not fit within today\u2019s criteria and infrastructure capabilities, until the completion and commissioning of the center in Timi\u0219oara, will be transferred to Europe,\u201d said health minister Alexandru Rogobete, the last in a line of 11 health ministers in 10 years, cited by Euronews Romania<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Among the centers promised, the Timi\u0219oara center is the one closest to being finished, according to the government. The pediatric center in Bucharest is 34% complete. The one in T\u00e2rgu-Mure\u0219, 36%.<\/p>\n

The executive says that the one in Timi\u0219oara, which is 78% complete, will be ready by the end of 2025.<\/p>\n

No Treatment, No Accountability<\/h3>\n

Aside from the healthcare aspect, the Colectiv fire also represents the injustice that impacts Romanian society as a whole. Few people have been found guilty of the case. The club owners, two firefighters, and the pyrotechnicians were convicted to prison terms ranging from 6 to 11 years and 8 months.<\/p>\n

No state official has been held accountable, except for the former mayor of District 4, Cristian Popescu Piedone, who was released after only one year of a four-year sentence<\/a>. Immediately after his release, Piedone became mayor of District 5 and was later named head of the Consumer Protection Agency.<\/p>\n

A larger case, which concerned former health minister Nicolae B\u0103nicioiu, former prime minister Victor Ponta, state secretary Raed Arafat, former interior minister Gabriel Oprea, and several hospital managers accused of transferring patients abroad too late, was closed in June 2024.<\/p>\n

Following appeals, in July 2025, judges from the High Court of Cassation and Justice (or \u00ceCCJ) sent the case back to the Prosecutor\u2019s Office and decided to reopen the investigation. Numerous other major investigations have seen a similar trajectory in Romania, being passed around for decades.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Legacy of Pain<\/h3>\n

Despite the few legal and systemic transformations, Colectiv remains a painful moment in Romanian history.\u00a0Several civic organizations are organizing a march<\/a> in Bucharest on Thursday, October 30, to mark ten years since the event which resulted in the death of 65 people. The participants are demanding justice and denouncing that no one has paid for that tragedy.<\/p>\n

\u201cClosed cases and annulled sentences are not justice! The victims deserve the guilty to pay. Romania deserves that all those who made the #Colectiv tragedy possible be held accountable. The 65 deserve justice. Their voices have been silenced, but we can still shout,\u201d the organizers declared.<\/p>\n

President Nicusor Dan, seen largely as a reformist and an independent, also posted a message marking 10 years since the Colectiv tragedy.<\/p>\n

\u201cColectiv remains the mirror of a state that did not function […]. A mirror in which we see how laws exist only on paper, inspections are merely formal, and accountability dissolves into bureaucracy. A mirror that has shown us the same reality in other tragedies of the last decade,\u201d he said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The tragedy led to the birth of a vocal civil society, and public pressure led the political class to make reforms, according to the president. \u201cBut it is far from enough. Today, Romania still does not have fully functional burn centers, many hospitals continue to struggle with severe shortages, and the serious problem of nosocomial infections remains unresolved. The promises made back then have faded into passing priorities. These commitments cannot remain merely archival material,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

radu@romania-insider.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

(Photo source: Nicusor Dan on Facebook)<\/em><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

No burn treatment centers were built in Romania following the 2015 Colectiv club fire that killed 65 people, the majority of them from hospital-borne infections, despite numerous promises. On the evening of October 30, 2015, several hundred young people were in the Colectiv club in the former Pionierul factory in Bucharest, attending a concert by […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7482","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ofero.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7482","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ofero.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ofero.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ofero.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7482"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/ofero.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7482\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ofero.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7482"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ofero.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7482"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ofero.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7482"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}