xenophobic?
interesting assumption as I am married to a non UK national! Also, I didn't mention anything about nationality, race, colour, religion or anything else that would possibly quantify someone as xenophobic. I said people who have paid into the system. They might be white, black or green and come from mars.


note the part in the recipricol arrangement

for a condition that arose after arrival into New Zealand, OR became, or without treatment would have become, acutely exacerbated after arrival.

for New Zealand substitute UK, as it's a recipricol agreement

BTW I have worked in the NHS for 25 years. I also worked in aeromed for several years bringing back damaged holidaymakers from abroad, so I probably have a bit more insight into this the some of the more hysterical, but not entirely unexpected, reactions to my post. I have also seen many members of the 'barmy army', or just regular holiday makers who have come back from abroad (even from Europe) having had to pay for treatment, received no treatment, or received extremely substandard treatment. The main moral of the story, is get good insurance that covers you for everything you will be doing.

whether he gets treatment will depend on how carefully the hospital he visits checks peoples entitlement. I would suggest avoiding the London ones as they are the most keen as they suffer most from the health tourist issue. I have seen people present at my hospital for treatment because they have been turned away by London Hospitals.

My statement stands and I will not be retracting it. It is not an opinion, it is a statement of fact. If you don't like it, well, sorry, that's reality for you. It is not a service for foreign nationals who have injured themselves in other countries who should be carrying the appropriate insurance for the activities they are taking part in to be either treated in that country or aeromedded back home. Maybe they don't recognise the term health tourist because they don't get them in New Zealand, but in this country it is a significant problem.


I wish your friend well in his recovery, but it is not the responsibility of the NHS to deal with that. It is already stretched to treat those that are entitled. Whether he gets treatment or not is of course, a different matter. He may, (in fact, probably will) but he needs to be prepared for the fact that equally he may not.

I have to say, I´m rather shocked by your response. I would have thought you could have left your politics at the door and offered some useful advice to people who are obviously in need of it.

Given that you had to bring politics into this, I would ask you to provide some actual facts and statistics on this so called ´health tourism´because I am unable to find any. I am interested to know if this an actual problem or is nothing more than part of the recent onslaught from the right-wing gutter press to deflect blame away from the banking crisis and mismanagment of the economy, onto the usual scapegoat - immigrants.

I did a bit of googling, but only came up with reports that no one actual knows how much so called "health tourism" costs the NHS per year. As far as I was concerned, anyone from an EU or commonweath countries with healthcare agreements, the NHS bills the government of the patient, and so costs are covered in this respect. As a sidenote, the government did claim the figure of 11m GBP as the lowest estimate (i.e. made up) cost of health tourism to the UK taxpayer, later they gave a rather vauge figure of £70m and £300m, any of those figuers set against 'efficiency savings´(i.e. cuts), of 20 billion GBP, perhaps you are barking up the wrong tree mate.

Interestingly, in study here, it states that, in actual fact, so called ´health tourism´actually benefits the NHS in terms of profit, it´s a long read, but worth it perhaps if you feel so strongly as to turn up here and start bringing tabloid politics into a thread that is quite clearly a call for help from people who do not have so many options left. For me, that is very "unBritish", but then maybe my values of Britishness are somewhat dated.

Best regards,
rtw

If you read my previous posts properly you will see that my view is based on my own experience of working in the NHS, not that of the papers, which I don't actually read anyway for the very reasons you suggest.

As also stated, my wife is from overseas, eastern europe in fact, as are many of my friends and acquaintances. One of my best friends from my university days is muslim, as are many more of my friends and acquaintances, so I am actually quite sensitive to the gutter press' ill thought out, ill judged and frequently inaccurate reporting on immigration and the current hysteria over muslims and eastern europeans, none of which is relevant to this subject anyway.

Your post is irrelevant to the discussion as my post was not based on any particular view I may or may not have on immigration. Neither was it suggesting any value on the cost to the NHS. It was a statement of fact that someone who is not entitled to NHS care should not expect it and that the treatment of people who are not entitled has a cost (of, shall we agree, an unknown amount) which has to be found from an already overstretched service.

I would have thought it was useful advice to know that, after the difficulty and expense of getting to the UK, he may find he was told he is not eligible for treatment (as stated in the post of mine you have quoted). I would quite like to know that was a possibility before I set off. The NHS is tightening up on these things so you cannot assume treatment will be given.

Am I unbritish, well, I guess that depends on how you view over 20 years of service in her Majesty's Armed Forces!

My daughter lives in NZ and I have been a frequent visitor over the last few years.
I wouldn't dream of not having full insurance irrespective of any agreement between countries. What you certainly don't need in any medical situation is someone having to look through the bureaucracy & lying about what's happened!

What's so odd about this case is the accident occurred in Croatia and not the UK.
What exactly can't they do in Croatia that we can do in the UK? Apart from provide free treatment?
If that's the only answer for travelling to the UK, then quite clearly this is an abuse of our NHS rather than having an insurance company pay for private treatment - either in the UK or Croatia. If insurance has been taken out, why not go to Germany?

__________________
Elaine

Striving to live the ordinary life in a non ordinary way

Having read this whole thread, I felt compelled to say something myself in support of above. Moggy's perfectly entitled to his opinion. He does not deserve to be attacked personally for his honest held beliefs...

I am becoming absolutely sick and tired of over-sensitive people who are oddly offended by FACTUAL words statements and mere honest held opinions and beliefs. Our hard won freedoms (in NZ as well as here in the UK) are under threat because of this kind of nonsense.

STICKS AND STONES........ What ever happened to that?

Actually I believe that the English (Anglo-Saxon) speaking countries of the world (UK,USA,Canada, Aussie, NZ etc) need to stick closely together in this violent world our failed political masters have created for us all. We should get out of the EU and return to the old British Commonwealth instead.

I personally have no problem whatsoever with a New Zealand Citizen using the NHS for free. Lets just consider their huge contribution in both world wars where their men came to the rescue of the mother country. Just look at what the Ausies and New Zeakanders did for us in Gallippoli.

That said, the NHS is heavily burdened by huge numbers of aliens who have no right to free NHS treatment. Apparently the majority of health tourists arrive from India, Pakistan and West Africa. It is these parasites who we need to stop NOT Anglo-Saxon New Zealander's who are in the main exactly the same as Brits and direct relations in many cases.

Of course I'm not suggesting for one moment that all citizens from these lands are parasites. Thought I'd better add that in case my words caused someone offence!!!!!!!!!!!

I know 3 people working in the NHS near Heathrow Airport and some of the stories I have been told infuriate me. Apparently there is a huge problem with pregnant NIGERIAN women turning up demanding free treatment. They get a taxi from the airport straight to the hospital. Most use the identity of a family member already living in the UK with the right of free treatment.

I wish the New Zealand guy (Deane) a speedy recovery and he's most welcome to use our NHS if he so desires (in my humble opinion)....

In any case the NHS is a dying service. I honestly doubt it will exist 15 years from now. Our masters know this and want us all to buy health insurance instead because it's less of a burden on the government. The UK is already bankrupt - It's paying it's bills by printing money and creating money by computer keyboard. Our public debt is heading for 1.6 Trillion pounds. That's a £30,000 debt for every man women and child living in the UK (think about that). Our politicians have been maxing out on the countries credit cards for nearly 30 years. We have ALL been living on CREDIT. Do the maths........ It's not just the UK either, the USA is also in exactly the same position as is most of the so called civilized world. Yes it's true we're all F*****!!!!!!

At the end of the day, I'm entitled to my opinion on this issue and others here are entitled to theirs. Lets all just Calm down............

__________________
Triumph Bonneville 800 (2004), Yamaha XT600E (1999), Honda XBR500 (1986).

In response to kentfallen

Just an aside - India, Pakistan and West Africa (well the countries you mean in West Africa)- all part of the Commonwealth -all contributed to the 2nd World War effort- maybe you would like to read this article for a start.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/africa/8201717.stm. All got exploited massively by the British Empire at some point in their history, with some pretty apalling atrocities along the way.

There are exploiters of systems at all levels - but it is usually the little people that get the bad press. Some of the biggest exploiters of systems are the multinationals and mega rich, but they have the power to manipulate the 'press', and it benefits them to set the poorer against each other- 'Divide and Conquer'

One can only hope that in time the human race evolves sufficently enough to forgoe its tribal nature and parochalism and realise that we are all inhabitants of a small piece of rock orbiting a minor star, and ultimately to ensure our survival as a species we will need to start working together, and not apart and against one another.

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I don't have to travel fast but I do need to travel cheap

kentfallen, when I first read this thread I didn't really think about Deane's ethnicity. I thought the discussion was around his nationality.


There's a fair chance that he's white, coming from NZ and with a English sounding name. But maybe he isn't.


I don't know if you've visited NZ but there are quite a few Maori / black / Asian people living there. And I bet there's more than one Maori / black / Asian guy called Deane who rides a motorbike living there.


So assuming, just for this discussion, that Deane isn't a white guy, would you still be as welcoming for him to use the NHS for free?

I thought kentfallen raised a good point: if you are travelling without insurance, what responsibility do the taxpayers of your host country have towards your medical care?

I've read and seen many stories in the media of other Canadians getting injured while visiting the neighbouring USA, and being hit with extraordinary bills because they were travelling without medical coverage for the US. Being a bit paranoid I have very good travellers insurance that provides up to $5 million worth of coverage while travelling in other countries.

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Bruce Clarke - 2020 Yamaha XV250

I don't think that's what he's saying though.


He's saying that Deane should be able to access free medical treatment in the UK as a NZ citizen, based on the assumption that he's "anglo saxon."


Kentfallen seems to be saying that only citizens of countries where the majority of the population is black or brown shouldn't be able to access free medical treatment in the UK.