Pensioners who come back for medical treatment most likely do so to be close to relatives who are able to visit them in hospital and provide the post-operative care and support that only relatives can.
Of course, the way to resolve this is simple. The pensioner should, on reaching the UK, claim political asylum and get free healthcare. What a stab in the back for those who have given their all for this country.
Christopher Troke
London SW13
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Understandably many Britons feel that their record of NI and tax payments should distinguish them from foreigners who qualify for the NHS simply through residence in Britain. After all, the health services of most European countries are contribution based. Yet EU health services are generally available to British pensioners even though they have paid nothing into them. Thus, if the pensioner accepts where he has made his bed and is happy to lie on it, it works out equitably in the end.
If, as Age Concern claims, some Britons in Spain feel disadvantaged by not being able to speak to Spanish doctors in their own language, they should perhaps consider changing beds.
Patrick Campbell
Campello, Spain
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From reports in your newspaper it seems likely that most pensioners would have requalified for UK residency by the time they get a hospital appointment on the NHS. Having experienced the Spanish healthcare system at first hand, it seems inconceivable that anyone in their right mind would wish to be treated in the UK in preference to Spain. I have no knowledge, however, of the Spanish mental health system.
Gethin Jones
Mijas, Spain
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Once again this “socialist” government is planning to penalise the most needy. This time it is pensioners (again) and asylum seekers who are to suffer.
Here in France, I am quite willing to utilise the finest health system in the world, but when I visit the UK I will be classed as an abuser of the system and will have to pay.
I hope Blair saves enough money to pay for the next Dome, war etc, although no minister is able to quantify the amount of “abuse”. I only hope there is enough left over to repay the 35 years of National Insurance contributions I and others have paid on the understanding that we would have free healthcare.
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John Locke
La Chaize-le-Vicomte, France