09.28.09
Canary Island health care drawing overseas patients
According to a recently printed article the Canary Islands are attracting thousands of visitors from across Europe for their health care service.
Over the period of May to October in health centres across the Canaries over one million non residents are treated. The majority of this group are retired British and German nationals. The health care comes at a cost of 20 million euros.
British residents are drawn by the lack of queues and that smokers can still obtain treatments without having to first go on a give up smoking programme.
Visitors from Belgium and Holland come for dialysis treatment as their national health service does not cover this treatment.
Free health care is not only exclusive to EU citizens either; many users are from family members of Latin American immigrants living in Spain; once they obtain resident status they return to their own country to undergo an operation which they can then claim through the Spanish national health system.
During summer in Tenerife, in the municipalities of Adeje and Arona around 60% of their patients are foreigners who, after an initial consultation, go on to have surgery before returning home.
The most popular operations are hip or knee replacements, heart surgery or treatment for tumours.