BUCHAREST — Oana Gheorghiu, proposed minister of health, has moved her office, her staff and her entire incoming ministry into the corridor of a Bucharest emergency hospital, declaring that she will govern Romanian healthcare from a folding chair positioned between a vending machine and a linen cart until further notice.
«The most important lessons are not in studies or government programs,» Gheorghiu said, adjusting a cushion she brought from home. «They are on the linoleum. I have been here for three days. I have learned more than in fifteen years of civil society. I intend to stay until the linoleum tells me everything it knows.»
The ministry's entire apparatus has followed. Deputy ministers now conduct meetings standing up, because there are no other chairs. The state secretaries have been assigned shifts. A spokesperson confirmed that all cabinet decisions will be made «within earshot of a working elevator,» and that any policy that cannot survive a corridor conversation will be discarded.
By Thursday, three hundred patients had been recruited as informal advisers. Gheorghiu has begun issuing directives from the chair, including a rule that every future health minister must spend one night per month on a hospital bench. The first volunteer was her own chief of staff, who lasted until 2 a.m.
«We are not waiting for miracles anymore,» Gheorghiu said, unfolding a blanket. «We are waiting for the 7 a.m. shift change. That is where the real system lives.»