Cash-strapped NHS hospitals have lost more than £180m to “health tourists” since the government pledged to crack down on the scandal.
Freedom of information data obtained by MailOnline shows NHS services are losing the equivalent of £100,000 a day due to unpaid care bills.
Critics say the lost money could have paid for the equivalent of 6,000 nurses, 5,500 doctors in training or 30,000 hip replacements.
While visitors to the UK can access urgent and emergency treatment from the NHS, they will be expected to pay for it.
Last year, the NHS wrote off £36m in health tourist debts, double the £16m recorded in 2017, the year the Department of Health issued strict new guidelines instructing staff to bill patients. before starting most treatments.
Cash-strapped NHS hospitals have lost more than £180m to ‘health tourists’ in five years; Here are the NHS trusts with total debts for unpaid bills exceeding £5 million
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London NHS trusts had the biggest write-offs, the FOI revealed, with Barts Health NHS alone accounting for £31m of the sum lost over the past five years.
London trusts King’s College Hospital Trust and Guy’s and St Thomas’ Trust had bills of £15.2m and £13.3m respectively.
Some individual patients have previously left unpaid NHS bills worth £500,000.
This includes a Nigerian woman who gave birth to quadruplets after going into labor shortly after landing at Heathrow.
Priscilla, 43 years old at the time, intended to fly to Chicago to have her babies, but was turned away by U.S. officials on the grounds that she would not be able to afford the costs of medical care.
Two died shortly after because they were too premature. The other two, Elijah and Esther, spent weeks in the hospital’s neonatal intensive care ward, racking up a hefty bill.
Experts also fear that the published total is just the tip of the iceberg, as it only represents cases where invoices were generated and then not paid.
They suspect that in many cases NHS officials have never issued invoices to health tourists because they believe payment has not been very successful.
NHS hospitals must charge patients who are not resident in the UK a fee of 150 per cent of what it would normally cost the health service to carry out any procedure normally.
For example, it has been estimated that a hip replacement costs the NHS £6,000, but under the above rules it would cost a foreign visitor £9,000.
Patients who need emergency care are still billed, but are billed after any medical care.
These rules apply to both foreign travelers visiting the UK and non-resident British citizens, for example expats returning home to visit family.
Government modeling before the crackdown, published by then Health Secretary and now Chancellor Jeremy Hunt, estimated that more consistent charging for overseas patients using NHS services would net the country an additional £500 million.
But a report from the National Audit Office said the money raised would fall far short of that target.
While the Conservatives announced a crackdown on health tourists in 2017, they reiterated their commitment to stopping the practice in 2019.
Former Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s 2019 election manifesto said: “We will clamp down on health tourism, ensuring those foreigners who use NHS services pay their fair share.”
“And we will increase the NHS surcharge paid by foreigners.”
Alp Mehmet, chair of campaign group Migrationwatch UK, said MailOnline’s “sobering” figures showed a lack of progress in resolving the issue.
“In fact, the total cost could be even higher; “If the NHS made more efforts to recover costs from those who are not entitled to free treatment,” she said.
‘Ultimately, these huge costs are borne by hard-pressed taxpayers. “This is tremendously unfair.”
A Nigerian mother who gave birth to quadruplets on the NHS in 2016. Priscilla, who was 43 at the time, went into labor shortly after landing at Heathrow Airport, her case costing the NHS £500,000.
Howard Cox, Reform UK’s London mayoral candidate, called for greater action by the government on emissions that cost the capital’s hospitals millions.
“Our impotent and financially incompetent management in the NHS and Government appears clumsy in how to stop the growth of increasingly unpaid amounts and, as always, all at the expense of taxpayers,” he said.
‘With hospitals reportedly in financial trouble and under so much pressure, it is time for Victoria Atkins, Secretary of State for Health to negotiate with the governments where most of these freeloaders come from, to seek fair and adequate compensation for the care they have received.
‘Otherwise, let’s adopt the American system and look at your valid health insurance first, before receiving any kind of medical care.
“Now, that approach can stem the flow of freeloaders visiting our long-suffering hospitals.”
A Department of Health and Social Care spokesperson said: ‘All taxpayers support the health service and it is fair that overseas visitors contribute to the costs of their treatment.
‘Between 2015/16 and 2021/22, foreign visitor receipts of more than £4 billion were reported.
‘To improve recovery of charges, non-urgent NHS care should be paid for in advance and any debt arising from the provision of urgent care before payment should be pursued.
“To incentivize payment, anyone applying for a new visa who has an outstanding debt to the NHS may have that application refused and will therefore not be allowed to return to the UK until the debt has been paid. In its whole”.
While health tourists have to pay for most NHS treatments, some are free for everyone.
These include attending A&E for an assessment, although this does not include any further treatment, family planning services not including abortions or IVF, and treatment for illnesses that could infect the general public.
There is also no charge for any treatment for injuries and conditions caused by torture, mutilation or domestic or sexual violence that has occurred in England, although those who come to the UK specifically for treatment in these areas will still have to pay.