Head of Sofia Regional Health Inspectorate resigns

The head of Sofia Regional Health Inspectorate, doctor Dancho Penchev, has resigne, the Ministery of Health announced on October 26.

Penchev submitted resignation after talks with Health Minister, Kostadin Angelov.

The Health Minister accepted the resignation.

According to the information availbale until now, the reason for the resignation was that in the space of just a week, at the discretion of Penchev, RHI in Sofia made two exceptions to the quarantine rules for the contacts of people infected with coronavirus and the quarantines for President Rumen Radev and Prime Minister Borissov were lifted.

The quarantines for the Minister of Finance, Kiril Anaiev and the former PR adviser of the PM, Sevdalina Arnaoudova, were also lifted. They were among the persons who were in contact with the Deputy Regional Development Minister, Nikolai Nankov, who last week tested positive for the virus.

Penchev said that his decision for lifting the quarantines was after they had two consecutive negative PCR test results.

The Director of Sofia RHI argued that legal regulations allow for a quarantine to be lifted early in the case of frontline doctors and officials whose job is of great public importance such as the President, the Prime Minister.

The Health Minister said in a post on Facebook today that his order does not allow for such exceptions and added that the quarantine rules apply equally for all Bulgarian citizens.