Corruption Barometer fom 2021

• Nowadays, there is a broad consensus on the negative economic, social and political impact of corruption. Despite the general idea that corruption is primarily a problem of poor countries, the report from Transparency International on the state of corruption in the EU clearly demonstrates that all European countries are struggling with it, although to different extent.

• During the Covid-19 pandemic, far too many European citizens encountered corruption directly when accessing health care services . According to the Global corruption barometer – European Union from 2021, using personal connections to gain quicker and better access to healthcare was a common practice. In Czechia, one in two citizens reported using family or social connections they have to skip the line. Similarly, Hungarians, Romanians, Poles, Croats, Portuguese, Spaniards, Austrians and French relied heavily on personal connections to access healthcare.

• In general, the use of bribes that are illegal in most countries seems to be less common. However, bribery remains one of the main challenges, especially in CEE countries where proportion of people admitting they gave a bribe is over EU average (7%). The most reported case there were in Romania (22%), Bulgaria (19%), Hungary (17%), Lithuania (17%) and Croatia (14%).

• Learn more: https://www.transparency.org/en/gcb/eu/european-union-2021