Free healthcare

[Gob]

Foreigners are billing the NHS for expensive healthcare they receive in their own countries, a Daily Mail investigation can reveal.

Under an extraordinary legal loophole, migrants are able to charge the full cost of medical treatment in their home countries to the UK, even if they have never paid a penny of tax in Britain.

They do this by obtaining European Health Insurance Cards from the NHS. The cards were intended for British people to use in cases of emergency while on holiday and entitle them to charge the NHS for the cost of any medical treatment they might urgently need while overseas within Europe.

But the NHS is handing out more than five million of these EHIC cards for free every year – and keeping no record of how many are being given to foreigners.

The cards are given out freely to any EU citizens who says they are living in the UK, even if they haven’t actually worked or paid any tax here.

As a result, Eastern Europeans can obtain the cards, then return to their home countries and use them to have medical treatment they would usually have to pay for funded by the NHS.

And because the cards last for five years, they are worth a fortune to migrants with ongoing conditions, or who have multiple pregnancies and births.

In an undercover investigation, an Eastern European woman working for the Mail – who has never lived or paid taxes in Britain – was able to get one of the cards after visiting the UK for less than a day.



Hungarian journalist Ani Horvath took it to clinics and hospitals in her native Hungary which confirmed she could use it to get maternity care and even skin treatments paid for by the UK taxpayer.

When she asked maternity clinic staff how many Hungarian women had registered for appointments covered by the NHS, she was told: ‘A lot of people. More and more.’

Using the card, she could have registered for a consultation with an optometrist costing a potential £150 or one with a dermatologist for £130 – or even antenatal and birth/maternity care for one pregnancy at £9,500, or a £47,000 liver transplant.

I have never lived, worked or paid taxes in Britain. But a few weeks ago, I registered for five years of health treatment at your expense at a clinic near my home in Budapest, Hungary.
I visited my local optician, dermatologist and even a transplant clinic – and was told the UK would pay for creams, eye tests and liver surgery if I needed them.
At my local maternity centre, dozens of Hungarian women like me are having their births paid for by the British NHS too.
A practice manager there took me into a bright office decorated with pictures of babies and showed me a stack of papers. There were dozens of forms, piled high. All of them had been filled in by expectant mothers in this one small area of Budapest whose appointments are now being paid for by the British taxpayer.
I asked how many women had registered for appointments covered by the NHS. ‘A lot of people,’ she said. ‘More and more.’
If you are pregnant, in need of a transplant, or even just have a minor condition such as a rash or short-sightedness, all it takes to have your bills covered by the UK taxpayer is a little blue card.
And I got mine for free from the NHS without ever seeing a UK doctor or nurse. For the past few months, I have been working with the Daily Mail’s Investigations Unit to test how easy it is for non-British people to have their healthcare paid for by the UK.
Healthcare is expensive in Eastern Europe and increasing numbers are charging their treatment to Britain. They are doing so using UK-registered European Health Insurance Cards.
These cards are meant to be used only by British tourists and entitle them to public healthcare while travelling in European Economic Area countries and Switzerland.
But there is no requirement to prove you work in Britain to get one. All you need is an NHS number – which anyone can get by signing up at a GP surgery, even if you are a failed asylum seeker.
In Hungary, you have to pay 8.5 cent of your monthly salary for state healthcare. So you can see why people so desperately want to get hold of them. They are a goldmine.
A concerned NHS doctor had told the Mail how easy it was for foreign nationals with no entitlement to free care to get hold of the cards.