On January 29, a fire ripped through a hospital in Romania’s capital, Bucharest, ending at least five people’s lives. It was the second such disaster to hit Romania’s already beleaguered health care system in just a few months, after a November 2020 blaze at a facility in Piatra Neamt. The fire led to a motion of censure against the newly appointed health minister, though it was voted down in Parliament. The population’s disgust was more obvious than ever, and trust in the health care system further diminished.

The trade unions had already been in the streets for a month before the blaze, protesting a wage freeze. Now they took the message further, criticizing the effects of neoliberalism on Romania’s public services. Already eleven years ago, the austerity measures imposed amid the global financial crisis left Romania’s health care system underfunded, cutting public employees’ wages by 25 percent and reducing funding to public institutions. With sixty-seven hospitals closing in 2011 alone, this vital service was left crippled. Today, faced with the COVID-19 pandemic, the dire results are becoming clear to see.

The specific trigger for the union protests in January was Law 226/2020, which froze public service employees’ wages — notwithstanding a previous 2017 law that had promised 25 percent annual raises. Since passing this legislation, the government has stepped up its confrontation with the country’s labor unions, proposing to cut bonuses and vacation vouchers. It has also declared a nationwide war on social welfare, marketed as a campaign of curbing a system of fraudulent and illegal payments.