Romania has huge debts to medical units abroad where it sent patients with serious health problems that could not be treated in the country, and because of this, soon, we could be notified that we are no longer accepted in hospitals abroad.
Romanian patients risk not being admitted to hospitals abroad – Photo Facebook
Romania owes over 340 million euros to hospitals in Germany, France, Italy or Spain for medical services provided to Romanian citizens. This was announced by Valeria Herdea, the president of the National Health Insurance Company (CNAS), who stated that we have to pay outstanding bills since 2015.
“The debts have accumulated mainly because in the last 5 years the state allocated much less money for these services than the National Health Insurance House requested“, explained the CNAS president.
And now we are required to start paying off our debts at least in installments, if we want to continue to benefit from medical services in other countries. Basically, we owe EU countries more than 340 million euros for the treatments offered to Romanian patients. The biggest debts are to Germany (over 130 million euros), followed by Spain (almost 50 million euros), Italy (43 million euros) and France (almost 39 million euros). According to the agreements, bills should be paid no later than 18 months after the end of the month the patient received the necessary care, and we have been in arrears since 2015.
How did it get here?
“It is very dangerous that such warnings appear every time during the summer period, when people travel as tourists. If they travel as tourists in Europe, you realize, many rely on the health card and the quality of being insured and go there without taking other complementary insurances. And there were situations where people remained in debt, they had to pay directly there, money was sent from the country, loans were made. It is not right what is happening, the Romanian state should also prioritize these payments“, explained Vasile Barbu, the president of the National Association for Patient Protection, for “Adevărul”.
Also, there are many Romanian citizens who establish their residence outside the country without paying complementary insurance in the country where they live.
“There are Romanian citizens who benefit from health insurance in Romania, but where they go they no longer benefit. And those pensioners, those people or people with disabilities who have fixed their residence outside consume quite a significant amount of money. Here Romania is discovered, normally the person in question should have taken care to take out insurance there that would be complementary, using also the quality of being insured in Romania“, says Vasile Barbu.
A badly managed health system
The bad part about us is that the social health insurance system, although it is apparently very favorable to patients, in reality it is not, because it introduces that limiting ceiling.
“The budget runs out very quickly. We have inflation in the health field, if we calculate it carefully we will see that it sometimes reaches figures of 25, 30, over 30% in a large number of services or products. Both public and private health spending has increased greatly. There are many aspects related to poor management of the health system and poor management of the regulations themselves. We have such thick regulations, but they are not meant to help“, emphasizes Vasile Barbu.
What to do
First of all, organizations, including those of doctors, propose bringing complex medical services, carried out abroad, into the private environment in Romania. “They are medical services that need a high level of competence, not from the point of view of the professional, but from the point of view of the endowment. And those private units have modern equipment, they have tools that allow them to tackle medical interventions that, apparently, cannot be done in the public sector here“, Vasile Barbu explains.
Then you should “to give priority to the financing of the health system, because, just as the payment system is affected, let's say, for hospitals outside and medical units outside, so are these in Romania affected, because the reality in the country's hospitals is quite cruel“, warns the patient representative.
How we can treat ourselves abroad
Romanians can receive medical care abroad as follows:
1. Medical emergencies – such as a heart attack, stroke, surgery or accidents – are covered by the European Health Card.
2. Form S1 – used by those who move temporarily, including pensioners looking after children, Erasmus students and workers seconded by companies.
3. Form S2 – used for patients with serious conditions who cannot receive the necessary treatment in time in the country, such as those with burns, neurological, hematological, cancer or heart diseases.
How many Romanians treated themselves outside?
In 2023, 720 Romanians were directed to treatment abroad because the Romanian state could not provide the necessary services in a timely manner. Most of the patients had diseases of the circulatory system (241), followed by oncological problems (140), and 102 children required specialized treatments. In 2022, the National Health Insurance House spent 132.6 million euros for the treatment of Romanians abroad.
