I joined 160 attendees to the Medact meeting on Universal health care with look at other countries such as Sweden and Spain...There was good historical look to charges in the UK.. and in our chat we were highlighting the problem of British Nationals that have lived outside the UK returning to find they are also charged for NHS care! so I see this is not just a migrant or racist issue but that there are dynamics when you have not been contributing to tax & NI while out of the country. Families have been caught out with this as they bring elderly relatives to be cared for.. So it is a complex situation. But I feel we really do need a universal healthcare so no one that needs treatment is denied it through lack of funds or if private insurance will not cover. We need compassionate politics. A new report by the New Economics Foundation and the Patients not Passports coalition shows that the struggle for universal healthcare is not unique to the NHS in the present moment. Similar restrictions on migrants’ access to healthcare have been advanced by Governments across Europe, and have been tried before in the NHS’s past. But these policies have been met by strong resistance and opposition, with coordinated campaigns successfully organising against them.
Sweden: Healthcare in Sweden Commonwealth fund Sweden
Spain: 1978 All residents had the right to healthcare regardless of universal cover. But a series of changes occurred between 2011 - 2018Overview of the Spanish Healthcare System I brought up concern for British citizens post Brexit as many of our retired citizens are living in Spain. There is concern over pension payments and European Health Care Card... nothing seems clear as yet.
