National Health Service Or International Health Service?

[anotheoldgit]

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3683605/Health-tourists-jump-NHS-queue-Foreign-patients-given-eye-surgery-Britons-wait-months.html

Nigel Farage once mentioned this type of thing and was lambasted for it, but how much longer is it going to continue to take place?

[Gromit]

// Cataract surgery is a procedure to remove eye lens and in most cases replace it with artificial lens. In Zimbabwe, eye surgery costs between US$800 to US$1,500 at private hospitals.

At public hospitals it costs between $300 to $600 but due to deteriorating social services, many Zimbabweans have had to live with cataract-induced blindness. //

There are charities that do the operations for free.

http://www.voazimbabwe.com/a/hundreds-of-zimbabweans-seek-free-eye-cataract-opeations-in-harare/2987339.html

[Baldric]

/// There are charities that do the operations for free. ///

And it appears one of them is our very own NHS.

It needs to be sorted, and soon!

[EDDIE51]

I am simply pointing out the reason that people who arrive here with preexisting urgent conditions are treated as a priority.
There is a big problem, I have posted before about the 'Lagos Shuttle' where heavily pregnant women arrive on a Nigerian Airways flight just in time to be rushed to the nearest maternity unit. I do not know how we solve it , but medical ethics demand that we do not deny emergency treatment to those who need it. Those who arrive are sufficiently knowledgeable to only arrive when their condition is so serious they have to be treated as an emergency with no time to arrange payment first.

[jackthehat]

///It needs to be sorted, and soon!///

It does.
And if the NHS starts sending out the message that it is now going to actively seek payment for treatment, it may dissuade some health-tourists from attempting to come and abuse our hospitality.

[retrocop]

Gromit
I looked at your link. I searched and found no article about a man travelling abroad. I note that there were botched cataract ops in India and Brazil and that Kent residents will be entitled to cataract treatment in Calais as a NHS referral providing they pay their own travel exes. I had heard some time back that the NHS were going to refer patients to India at cost to the NHS for cataract ops.
I note that a Professor from Royal Marsden has researched the costs of non-payment by health tourists.
That is of interest to me as I am still a regular out patient at the RMH Surrey.
The waiting Halls, of which there are two, (too large to be described as rooms) hold about 180-200 patients. I would hazard a guess that a good many are health tourists as they eagerly search for their NHS supplied and funded interpreters. Oh how I wish I was fluent in an African dialect especially as the RMH is on my doorstep!!

[retrocop]

EDDIE51
The Americans have managed very well for years. They put the human aspect 2nd and cold cash first!

// I do not know how we solve it , but medical ethics demand that we do not deny emergency treatment to those who need it. Those who arrive are sufficiently knowledgeable to only arrive when their condition is so serious they have to be treated as an emergency with no time to arrange payment first.//

We do not allow the debtors to return without payment or we recoup the money from the Embassy/Government of that person.
Most of these countries get enough OAD money from us as it is. Perhaps if we stop that or threaten to the money (debts) might be forthcoming.

[Togo]

Funny how you never hear the Consultants, Doctors, Nurses, or Admin wonks, complaining that the burden of treating foreign Nationals is putting a strain on their working duties, and contributing to them having to function under undue stress, therefor making the process unsafe. Perhaps it is a covert, deliberate policy, with an underlying political agenda.

[douglas9401]

Two questions:
Can I see your passport please?
How will you be paying your bill?

On receiving satisfactory responses, treatment can begin.

It's not difficult.

[EDDIE51]

Retrocop even in the USA emergency medical treatment will be given before they seek payment. I do not know what happens to those that receive treatment but are then found not to be able to pay.
Keeping the debtors here as you suggest would very soon create another problem, as we would have to pay for their keep. I can see that if we adopted that approach we could be flooded with 10,000s of people who arrive here with urgent medical problems but no way to pay. They would know that to stay in the UK permanently all they have to do is arrive as a medical emergency and then stay here at taxpayer expense for ever.
There is already a way to solve much of this, hospitals are supposed to find out the origins of overseas patients and then seek payment from their home governments. Of course they say they do not have the time or resources to do this as they have to concentrate on providing treatment.
A fine case of Catch 22, they do not seek repayment as they can't afford to which just makes the problem even worse!
I do not know the solution to this, any workable suggestions that do not create another even worse problem?

[EDDIE51]

douglas9401. That has already been ruled out! As I said these people arrive ONLY when their condition is already so serious that emergency treatment is needed.
We can not refuse emergency treatment until payment has been worked out not even the USA does that.

[mushroom25]

//We can not refuse emergency treatment until payment has been worked out not even the USA does that. //

in 1985, that's exactly what happened to Joe Simpson after his accident in the Andes (q/v "touching the void") - having got to Lima in 3 days by mule/truck, he lay in a peruvian hospital for 2 days while the authorities argued with his insurance company.

[EDDIE51]

douglas, what do you suggest if they say they have no way to pay or lie?
Do we just leave them to die or go blind?
The 'Lagos Shuttle' women are usually actually in the first stage of labour when they arrive or even have given birth on the plane! No time to ask about payment.

[Gromit]

Specifically cataracts, there seems to be several charities that raise money for operations in the third world, then of course we could fund operations from our oversees aid budget, and get them done at point of need instead of here.

http://www.sightsavers.org

Eyes for Zimbabwe charity reckon an operation there costs £15 through their charity and the procedure takes 10 minutes.

http://golfblog.dailymail.co.uk/2012/06/centurions-ladies-european-tour-golfers-laurette-maritz-and-cecilie-lundgreen-play-100-holes-in-a-da.html

[douglas9401]

Here you go then, bill the airline for carrying emergency cases to the land of milk and honey.
A wheel clamp on their shiny new Dreamliner and a queue of irate onward passengers will soon stem the flow of chancers.

[EDDIE51]

Mushroom, Peru is not the USA. Are you suggesting we lower our standards of care to those of a bankrupt third world nation?

[EDDIE51]

douglas something like that may work. Try suggesting it to the government!
It is way outside what a hospital could do though, a job for the government.

[douglas9401]

"Are you suggesting we lower our standards of care to those of a bankrupt third world nation?"

Only for chancers from bankrupt third world nations.

[mushroom25]

//Mushroom, Peru is not the USA. Are you suggesting we lower our standards of care to those of a bankrupt third world nation? //

Eddie, we ARE a bankrupt 3rd world nation.

[EDDIE51]

A visa system may work. I have lived in Saudi Arabia, if you arrive there without a valid visa the airline that carried you is charged $10,000 per passenger as well as having to return them to where they came from free!
Still would not work for places like Nigeria though, the government there is so corrupt that you can buy a visa by paying a bribe no matter what your condition.

[EDDIE51]

Mushroom25 we are the world's 9th richest nation
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_(PPP)
VERY far from a bankrupt 3rd world nation.