Corruption with a certificate: how doctors from the MSEC and officials profit from disability
9 December 15:05
ANALYSIS 
On the eve of the International Anti-Corruption Day, the National Agency for the Prevention of Corruption (NAPC) has completed full audits of 22 declarations of officials of medical and social expert commissions (MSECs). According to their results, signs of declaring false information in 18 declarations worth over UAH 148.9 million and signs of illicit enrichment in one declaration worth UAH 16.4 million were found, and 17 substantiated conclusions were sent to law enforcement agencies. What kind of punishment awaits doctors, how serious it is and who has already been convicted – found out
Doctors who do not live on one salary
The NACP has checked the declarations of the heads of the medical examiner’s offices for two years and has drawn disappointing conclusions – few of them live on one salary.
The head of Zhytomyr MSEC No. 2 “forgot” to declare information about her husband and his property: three apartments in Kyiv, Zhytomyr and Odesa Oblast, two houses in Zhytomyr Oblast (one of which was actually occupied by the official herself), cars (Toyota Land Cruiser Prado 150, Volvo C30), his income and bank accounts. The declaration for 2023 revealed signs of false information in the amount of over UAH 5 million, and for 2024 – in the amount of over UAH 5.2 million.
The chairman of the neuro-ophthalmic MSEC is a neurologist at the Regional Center for Medical and Social Expertise of the Zaporizhzhia Regional Council. Inconsistencies amounting to more than UAH 2.9 million were found in the declaration for 2024: the car HYUNDAI IX 35 used by her, a gift in cash worth more than UAH 360 thousand, and she did not confirm the source of the declared cash amount of USD 30 thousand. USD.
An expert doctor of the Regional Center for Medical and Social Expertise (Kharkiv) did not indicate in her declaration for 2023 the apartment in Kharkiv where she actually lived and the funds in her bank accounts worth more than UAH 1.7 million. She also failed to disclose information about her income received on a card account from third parties in the amount of over UAH 530 thousand.
Currently, two more declarations submitted by MSEC employees are being checked. But there are already first verdicts.
The Vynohradiv District Court of Zakarpattia Oblast found the head of the Berehove District Medical Examination Board guilty of committing a criminal offense under Part 2 of Article 366-2 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine (CCU) “Declaring false information” and imposed a fine of UAH 68 thousand with deprivation of the right to hold senior positions in healthcare institutions and expert teams to assess the daily functioning of a person for a period of 1 year. For concealing from declaration a land plot owned by her husband worth more than UAH 9 million.
And the Sobornyi District Court of Dnipro found the former head of the Dnipro Regional Medical Examination Board guilty of false declaration of property and sentenced her to a fine with deprivation of the right to hold positions of director of municipal institutions and municipal enterprises in the field of medicine for one year. This is because she failed to disclose in her 2023 declaration real estate, her husband’s car, and his income of approximately UAH 3.2 million. The sentence has come into force.
Expensive disability for officials
Throughout the history of independent Ukraine, MSEC doctors have never been in poverty because they put a spoke in the wheel when issuing disability certificates and solved this issue solely for money. In peacetime, there was one amount, in wartime – a completely different amount. The case of Tetiana Krupa, the former head of the Khmelnytsky MSEC, is particularly illustrative.
In October 2024, SBI officers searched the official’s apartment and office. At her workplace, they found $100,000, “a number of medical documents that may be forged,” as well as “lists of ‘evaders’ with names and fictitious diagnoses.” At Krupa’s home, law enforcement officers found $3.174 million, 135,000 euros and more than a million hryvnias in cash, as well as documents on Krupa’s $590,000 account at the Polish bank Pekao.
According to the prosecutor’s office, during the search, Krupa tried to get rid of some of the money and threw a bag with $500,000 out the window. During the pre-trial investigation, it turned out that Tetiana Krupa and her relatives had taken hundreds of thousands of dollars in undeclared funds out of Ukraine and deposited them into accounts in Poland and Austria. In particular, in October 2022, Krupa, according to the investigation, secretly took $600,000 to Poland.
At the same time, it turned out that one of the main and most grateful clients was local prosecutors, both former and current. Among them were 49 disabled people of the second and third groups. Some of them had their status confirmed, some had their group downgraded, and the rest turned out to be “fake.” And this is only in the Khmelnytsky region.
In total, there were 484 prosecutors with disabilities in Ukraine, and inspections began and are still ongoing. Some have already resigned, while others are awaiting trial. For example, the former prosecutor of the Khmelnytskyi District Prosecutor’s Office, against whom the SBI sent an indictment to court for illegally obtaining a Group II disability and an increased pension.
According to the investigation, in 2020, the regional prosecutor, with the help of employees of the medical and social expert commission, received a lifetime disability, although he had no grounds for it. He subsequently received a pension from the Pension Fund. The total amount of payments he received is over UAH 1 million. The former prosecutor is accused of fraud on a large scale (Part 5 of Article 190 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine). He faces up to 12 years in prison with confiscation of property. The MSEK doctor who facilitated the scheme will be held liable for forgery in office.
The SBI is checking more than 2,600 medical files of officials from more than 70 government agencies. More than 800 decisions on disability have already been canceled, in more than 400 cases the disability group or term has been changed, and almost 100 people have been summoned for further examination.
According to SBI Head Oleksiy Sukhachov, most often fictitious disabilities were issued to obtain a pension or to evade military service.
“The largest number of officials whose disability has been canceled is among employees of the State Customs and Tax Services, the Prosecutor’s Office, and law enforcement agencies,” Sukhachov said.
A great niche for doctors to make money
But, according to the lawyers, not only doctors from the MSEC have put their earnings on the line today. They also include doctors from the MCC’s medical and psychiatric clinics. Recently, in Odesa, four doctors from the Prymorskyi district’s medical and voluntary clinical commission were caught offering conscripts a deferment from service for $16,000.
“There are a lot of similar cases today, but the problem is that the maximum punishment they face for this is a fine and a ban on holding positions in medicine. But there is no confiscation, meaning that they will keep everything they bought with corrupt money. And no one will deprive them of their right to practice their profession; they will find a job in a private clinic and will be out of business. And what they already have will be enough for a comfortable life. The Ukrainian Themis is loyal to millionaires who got rich illegally, but at the same time punishes a poor man who stole sausage in a supermarket with a real term,” says
By the way, while in 2021 the MSEC was mentioned in 804 court decisions, in 2024 there were already more than 2,500 such decisions. If until 2022, the services of the MSEC were used for the sake of an increased pension, then for the last four years they have been used to avoid mobilization. And doctors make a lot of money on this. The amount varies from ten to infinity thousands of dollars. And if there is demand, there is supply.
The author: Alla Dunina
