RWANDA, BURUNDI: Rwandans travel to Burundi for healthcare
Since a national insurance system was launched in Rwanda, citizens regularly
cross the Burundi border to get better, cheaper care.
Rwanda is a poor rural country with and although it has a national insurance
system, local hospitals are every strict on not offering free treatment even
if just one family member at an address is not recorded as having paid for
their health insurance card. Records are poorly kept and hospitals use any
excuse.
Across the border in neighboring Burundi, doctors and nurses are less
strict; the National Health Service is also much less expensive, and
available both for Burundians and Rwandese. The Burundian health service is
fast and efficient and often treats Rwandese patients first due to the
distance they travel.
Another advantage for patients crossing the border is that several Burundian
hospitals are close to the border with Rwanda. Going there costs less than
being transferred to more distant Rwandese hospitals. The subscription to a
private insurance is optional in Burundi, as opposed to Rwanda where it is a
compulsory national insurance scheme run by private insurers.
The currency exchange rate also affects the medical exodus to Burundi. One
Rwanda franc is worth more than two Burundi francs. So care is cheaper in
Burundi.
The migration of Rwandese patients started as soon as the nation's
compulsory private health insurance policy was launched in 2009. The
authorities did not understand why a large number of people living near the
border had still not subscribed to this new universal access to health care.
Very poor people from the overpopulated region of the North, who came East
searching for arable lands, were the first to go to the Burundian health
services.
It has become normal for Rwandese people who live near the Burundian border
to go over the border just for minor treatment.
Burundi, one of the world's poorest nations, is struggling to emerge from a
12-year, ethnic-based civil war. Half the population lives below the poverty
line.
Medical tourism news
23 September 2013
Thé Mulindwas Communication Group
"With Yoweri Museveni and Dr. Kiiza Besigye Uganda is in anarchy"
Kuungana Mulindwa Mawasiliano Kikundi
"Pamoja na Yoweri Museveni na Dk. Kiiza Besigye Uganda ni katika machafuko"
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