Keeping Healthy Abroad

A recent report in the Telegraph has highlighted the view of some of the British expatriates who are now living in Spain and paying the so-called ‘care tax’ each month; this is the tax payment that enables them to have access to the local healthcare system if they are ineligible for free care on a reciprocal agreement basis with the UK.

We ran an article that looked at whether expats in Spain are better off paying this tax or buying an international insurance policy purely on a cost basis, but the Telegraph feature looked specifically at whether those paying the local tax actually felt they were getting good service and treatment levels for their monthly contribution.

As the article finds, not only is the Spanish bureaucracy associated with taxation and accessing the healthcare system in general not as onerous and inaccessible as first thought, but the actual medical care available in Spain is of a high standard, with any tax payment towards accessing care also deemed affordable.

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Spanish politicians and doctors have launched an attack against British expatriates who seek treatment for medical conditions when in Spain, and they have accused such Brits of being a drain on limited resources. 

One needs to scrape below the surface quite a way to discover why this attack has been levelled at Britons’ doors in particular, and what the expats are actually allegedly guilty of: but one thing the attack certainly does is ‘focus the mind!’  I.e., the Spanish attack on British expatriate patients brings the message home loud and clear – ‘Get Health Insurance!’ – or risk being left high and dry.

In a bid to clarify the position for British expats who’re thinking of moving to live, work or retire to Spain, this report will outline who is eligible for free health care in Spain, what your EHIC (European Health Insurance Card) will cover you for and when and why you really do need to get private medical insurance in place depending on your status.

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A new report from a highly respected source reveals that you have no reason to fear healthcare services abroad if you herald from the UK, because they are likely to be better than you’re potentially able to achieve back home in Britain!

The Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development has revealed that when it comes to cancer survival rates for example, even the likes of South Korea and Mexico top the UK.  This just goes to prove that the much lauded NHS is not working, and that if the current government is planning on even more investment cut backs to try and reduce the public deficit, things could get a whole lot worse.

If you’ve been thinking about retiring abroad or going overseas to work and you’re worried about healthcare standards abroad, it would appear that you perhaps don’t need to be!  Things in Britain are far from perfect – so if you have health worries perhaps you’d be better off emigrating after all!

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