The European Commission published on 17 March its latest report on the application of the cross-border healthcare directive, which shows that medical tourism remains a limited phenomenon. In three out of four cases, cross-border mobility was used between groups from neighbouring countries.
Directive 2011/24/EU, applicable since 2013, provides that a European patient treated in another Member State may be reimbursed for the costs of healthcare by the country of affiliation up to the level provided for by the healthcare system of that country.
The Commission’s report covers data collected between June and October 2020 and therefore also concerns the UK. It shows that four Member States have introduced measures to limit access to healthcare for a citizen from another Member State for “imperative reasons of general interest”, as provided for in the Directive. These are Denmark, Estonia, Romania and Wales in the UK, and Iceland outside the EU. However, only Denmark reported having used these mechanisms.
Neighbourhood as the main destination
Similarly, 20 Member States and Iceland have introduced a system of prior authorisation for certain types of health care, including those requiring at least one night in hospital. Of the 7,171 applications submitted, 78% were granted and two thirds of the refusals were related to the fact that the medical intervention was available within a reasonable time in the Member State of affiliation. According to the figures provided by the Member States, the expenditure per Member State was less than €500,000, except in the United Kingdom.
Another interesting element related to permit applications is the destinations. According to the data collected by the Commission, the vast majority (70%) of this mobility was between groups of neighbouring countries. The only exceptions were in the UK, where just under a quarter of treatments took place in Latvia and Hungary and many patients travelled to Germany.
Large variations in reimbursement
Finally, with regard to unauthorised travel, the 25 Member States that made these data available indicate that they received a total of 283,719 claims in 2019, 85% of which were accepted. €85.3 million, with significant variations between Member States (€25 million in Sweden and €900 in Spain).
Link to the report: https://bit.ly/3f9FeMN (Original version in French by Sophie Petitjean)