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Daily Mail
April 25, 2014
NHS hospitals are getting even worse at clawing back money for foreigners’ healthcare, despite ministers’ pledges to stamp out health tourism.
A £600million ‘health tourism gap’ sees the UK paying out £20 for the healthcare costs of Britons who fall ill on the continent for every £1 it gets back for the NHS treatment of European visitors.
The disparity is even worse than it was two years ago, when Britain paid out £16 for every £1 it got back.
It means that, despite promises from David Cameron and Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt to get to grips with the issue, the gulf is widening year on year.
The figures, released following a Freedom of Information request, show that in 2012/13, British taxpayers handed £649.3million to European governments to pay for the care of UK citizens who fall ill abroad.
But the NHS managed to collect only £32million from the same European countries to pay for the care of their citizens who needed treatment here.
Ministers claim ‘health tourism’ costs British taxpayers billions a year, as many NHS trusts do not even keep records of debts.
Last year cancer specialist Professor J Meirion Thomas warned of a ‘massive and escalating problem’ of foreigners travelling to Britain for cancer, HIV, kidney and infertility treatment then leaving without paying.
He said the NHS was also becoming the ‘world’s maternity wing’.
