If You Love the NHS - Wake up and Act

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Foreigners are taking advantage of the NHS and should only get free treatment if they have been paying taxes, David Cameron has said.

By Rowena Mason, "Political" Correspondent

1:20PM GMT 14 Feb 2013

The Prime Minister said Britain is "not tough enough right now" about stopping health tourists coming to Britain to use the NHS.

Speaking to workers at B&Q in Eastleigh, Mr Cameron said the health service should not be free for foreigners from outside the EU. Britain must also get better at charging other EU countries when their citizens use the NHS, he added.

"We're not tough enough right now about people coming from the other side of the world who decide to use our health service," he said. "They haven't contributed in their taxes. They should pay when they use the NHS."

Mr Cameron criticised the current system as he was asked about the pressure on NHS services if a wave of Bulgarians and Romanians immigrate to Britain when restrictions are lifted next year.

"We've made some progress but there's a lot more to do to make sure that while we're welcoming to immigrants we don't allow people to come here and take advantage of us, because I think that does happen too often," he said.

Mr Cameron this week launched a review into how foreigners access benefits. On a visit to support the Conservative Eastleigh by-election campaign, he said this review will look at all welfare payments and services, including health, housing and legal aid as well as traditional benefits.

It comes after GPs wrote to ministers last month demanding changes to stop widespread health tourism costing the NHS millions of pounds a year.

Recent guidance states that immigration status should be no bar to being registered with a doctor. GPs point out that once a foreigner patient has registered, hospital staff hardly ever check whether they are also entitled to more specialist NHS care.

A recent survey carried out by Pulse magazine has found 52 per cent of GPs thought NHS entitlements for migrants were too generous, while only seven per cent thought they were too stringent.

New guidelines from the Primary Care Commission state: “Nationality is not relevant in giving people entitlement to register as NHS patients for primary care services."

The guidelines also emphasise that anyone in the UK can register at a GP practice, no matter how long they have been in the country.

In 2010 a Department of Health report conceded that health tourism was costing the NHS at least £10 million a year in unrecovered costs, although doctors believe the true figure is far higher because most goes undetected.

Link to article:

 http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/healthnews/9870246/Foreigners-are-taking-advantage-of-the-NHS-David-Cameron-says.html