Meet the TikTok doc who wants to flip Hungary’s view of the EU

It’s a neat illustration of just how bad a rap the EU gets inside Hungary.
Hungarian heart surgeon-turned-MEP András Kulja has a clear goal for his five years in the European Parliament: To counter Prime Minister Viktor Orbán’s anti-EU rhetoric and persuade people back home that the EU ain’t that bad. 
And as a popular TikTok influencer, he has a ready pulpit from which to spread his message. 
“Brussels is not the devil, as [Prime Minister Viktor] Orbán says,” Kulja told POLITICO in his first interview since arriving in Brussels. “[His videos] say this every week.
“I want to show people that Brussels is not an evil thing.”
Kulja is a social media star in Hungary with hundreds of thousands of followers on TikTok and a strong presence on Instagram and YouTube where he posts fun and informative health-related posts in Hungarian.
He had just completed his residency in cardiac surgery when, inspired by working on EU health projects, he answered a call for applications to stand in June’s EU election for the Respect and Freedom (Tisza) Party led by Peter Mágyar — the rising star of Hungary’s opposition movement.  
Now in Brussels, Kulja says he’s going to use his influencer status to show his fans another view of the EU. “I think it is important. There is a communication barrier in Hungary [because] propaganda is so strong and so dominant.”
But Kulja’s acutely aware that his words will need to be backed up with action. “We have to show the Hungarians that we are here to work, we have to show results because the propaganda said that we came here just to get the money.”
Top of Kulja’s agenda is exposing the huge differences between health care services in Western European countries and Hungary — something that is virtually banned for medical professionals back home.
“Working in Hungary, I have seen from the inside the decline of the Hungarian health care system,” he told POLITICO, adding that he did not want to be a bystander as Hungary runs out of doctors, nurses and even essential medical devices and equipment.
He wants to use his time in Parliament “to draw the Hungarian people’s attention to the fact that by following a responsible health policy and learning from others, we have the opportunity to create a much better health care system.”
Kulja’s approach isn’t without its risks.
In Hungary, health care professionals are virtually banned from criticizing the health care system to the media in a law that was introduced during the pandemic. Press interviews must be approved by the health ministry, and few people want to risk their career with this level of scrutiny.
But in Brussels, unshackled from this law, he revealed to POLITICO some of the conditions under which he had to work.
Early in his career as a surgeon, Kulja said he witnessed “the growing shortage of equipment, doctors and nurses, and in many places, the minimum conditions for providing Western-standard care are not even given.”
He told POLITICO about not having essential instruments mid-surgery. One device, an intestinal stapler which he needed mid-surgery, was no longer available where he worked, “because the hospital was in such big debt that the company doesn’t send any more,” he said, recalling the explanation he was given.
Kulja saw patients having to wait months for appointments. “The primary health care system is absolutely falling apart,” he said, adding that the reason is the health care professional shortage.
The rate of preventable deaths in Hungary is the highest in the EU while life expectancy at birth is also among the lowest in the bloc, according to the EU Commission’s Hungary health profile 2021.
Health spending in Hungary is below the EU average both in terms of spending per capita and as a percentage of GDP. Public funding accounts for two-thirds of all health care spending, well below the EU average of 80 percent, leading to high levels of out-of-pocket spending.
“We have very, very serious problems,” Kulja said. If he was to share the realities of working as a surgeon with a German counterpart, “he or she will say that I’m crazy and I have to [see] a psychiatrist, because it cannot be,” he said with a soft smile.
A spokesperson for the Hungarian government told POLITICO that healthcare spending in 2024 is 2.5 times more than it was in 2010. “Due to the war that is being waged in our immediate neighbourhood and the economic crisis brought on by Brussels’ flawed sanctions, expenditures of the health care system, too, have increased significantly. However, the Government is committed to resolving the liquidity problems of hospitals within the shortest possible time,” the spokesperson said.
“Developments worth HUF 800 billion have been earmarked from the RRF [the European Commission’s Recovery and Resilience Facility] funds which Hungary has been denied access to for two years now,” they added.
Kulja only finished his surgery residency last November. He was to continue his career in cardiac surgery at the Cardiovascular Center in Budapest.
But the dire shortcomings in the system that he could not change from within pushed him to take his chances as a politician.
“In my own narrow workplace, I have tried to optimize processes and improve patient care, but I have seen that real improvement can only work at the state level, which I had no control over,” he said.
That’s is when he signed up to run in the EU election.
“I felt I had to try because even if I could not improve health care at home, I could do something at the European level to give the Hungarian health care system a chance to catch up,” he said.
He is also driven by a strong desire — perhaps inherited — to improve your lot in life if you have the opportunity.
When he was a child, his parents moved from Transcarpathia in Ukraine’s southwest to Hungary in search of a better future for their son. “I just felt that I have to do the same … for my son.” Now, he has moved from Hungary to Brussels with his family. 
He had to risk it all “for myself, for Hungarian kids, to give them a better future,” he said with a twinkle in his eye. “If I can do just a small thing … at least I can tell my son that I tried to do something.” 
In his first few weeks as a politician, Kulja secured a spot as a vice-president of the European Parliament’s Committee on the Environment, Public Health and Food Safety (ENVI), which leads Parliament’s legislative discussions on health files, and deputy-coordinator of the subcommittee for public health (SANT).
Although health care remains within the remit of national governments, one concrete way in which Kulja sees the EU playing a role is in helping tackle non-communicable diseases which he says are “very relevant to people in Hungary.”
“As a surgeon, I have seen first-hand the devastating impact of cancer, untreated diabetes and vascular disease, the consequences of late diagnosis and inadequate treatment of chronic diseases,” he said. “So my aim is to participate in health policy programs, to find solutions to these problems.”
“I also see improving health literacy in Europe as an explicit priority … Even with the most modern therapies available, if people do not trust doctors or recognize the initial symptoms, we lose years and even lives,” he said.
However, Kulja remains passionate about surgery. He hopes to return to Hungary and continue to pursue his career one day, but this might not be easy if the country is still under Orbán’s lead.
“If I have a mandate for just for five years, yes, I (will) try to go back. I hope the government will change. If not,” Kulja said, taking a deep breath, “we’ll see.”
UPDATED: This article has been updated to add comment from the Hungarian government.