A patient is stimulated with interactive images at Sant'Anna hospital in Crotone, south of Italy, December 16, 2014. Under pressure to curb the euro zone's second-largest public debt, successive Italian governments have slashed funding for regions by 10 billion euros in the last five years. Regional authorities in turn have targeted the largest item on their own budget: health spending. In Calabria, where Sant'Anna is located, the health service deficit has fallen to 40 million euros from 250 million euros since 2009. Because cuts are politically difficult, they have hit all of Calabria's hospitals in the same way, regardless of medical or economic performance. That means the Sant'Anna ? whose success rate in reawakening people from comas is nearly 20 percent higher than the Italian average ? faces similar cuts to those in any other hospital in the region. To match Insight ITALY-HEALTH/AWAKENINGS Picture taken December 16, 2014. REUTERS/Max Rossi (ITALY - Tags: POLITICS HEALTH SOCIETY BUSINESS)