1 week Ago By John Smith
Every country has its own form of bureaucracy and when you grow up, whether you realise it or not, you can often understand the rules and regulations. If you don’t, then you have every chance of being able to discover what’s required as you understand the language and the general way in which the rules work. This however becomes more problematical when you move to another country, especially if you don’t speak the language and have no background of understanding the way in which that country’s bureaucracy works.
Most Read on Euro Weekly News Top 4 best places to retire in Spain on €1,000 a month Are Chinese really leaving Spain? The truth behind the bazaar closures The 6 Best Places in Spain to Retire by the Beach Therefore many new settlers (word deliberately used to defuse arguments about expats or immigrants) find it difficult to understand let alone know what to do. They therefore have two stark options, firstly try to get help to wade through the requirements to deal with a whole load of complicated rules or alternatively to ignore them and get on with their lives, hoping for the best! This second route becomes more ‘dangerous’ the older that you get and a perfect example is health care in Spain where many British settlers who are now residents following Brexit and were UK pensioners had the right to join the social health service thanks to the existing reciprocity agreement between Britain and Spain, or if younger and they are/were working then they also had access to free health care. A number of retired pensioners , including myself, considered themselves healthy (if not that fit) and put off by the considerable form filling in Spanish, were content to pay the occasional private doctor for minor problems.
Free healthcare in Spain is obtainable for many foreign residents However at the age of 72, I found myself faced with a serious (at least for me) illness and without the funds to pay for long term investigation via the private route, realized how short sighted I had been and had to turn to the Spanish Health Service (Sistema Nacional de Salud or SNS) for help. Luckily, a Spanish friend working with my bilingual wife offered to organise my enrolment in the health service and because I had worked in Spain and held a social security number this was arranged quite quickly. Happily, although I had originally been admitted to the Costa del Sol Hospital as a ‘private patient’, I was able to present my health card and then not only was all treatment free but I was also able to obtain prescriptions at significantly reduced cost.
Don’t put off registering for Spanish healthcare if you are eligible Those readers who are citizens of the European Union and EAA but resident in Spain are generally able to enjoy free healthcare but are advised to check requirements for registration and any British passport holder should, if eligible, take the opportunity to register for social healthcare. The next article will give some idea of what to expect if you visit accident and emergency or are admitted to a Spanish hospital based on my personal experience as hospitals will differ across the nation..
