Legislation in Spain (national health system)
Asylum seekers and undocumented migrants are entitled to access health care on equal grounds as Spanish nationals in regards to coverage and conditions. The problem is that for undocumented migrants it is more complicated to comply with the administrative requirements, mainly the empadronamiento - local civil registration, because it implies having valid identity documentation and an address.
Children and pregnant women are exempted from any administrative requirement. At least four regions in Spain (out of seventeen) have adopted a more friendly approach consisting of providing a "health card" to all undocumented migrants without any kind of administrative conditions.
Download the report on the Spanish legislation on the access to health care for undocumented migrants and asylum seekers.
Download the Comparative overview of the legislation on access to health care for undocumented migrants and asylum seekers in 16 countries (in Spanish). Download the report in English.
Spanish News on health care
In the framework of the elections in Catalonia, the « Popular party » proposes that the municipalities report the registration with the local authorities ("empadronamiento") to the police in order to control irregular migration. Through this registration, people, including undocumented migrants, have access to healthcare and education.
Source: El País, "El PP catalán lleva el endurecimiento del padrón a su programa electoral"
The Spanish government is considering introducing a fee per visit for publicly funded healthcare services in a bid to help plug the hole in its finances. Health authorities in various autonomous regions like Catalonia, Valencia, Madrid, or Asturias, have backed this approach in the past few weeks, despite widespread opposition.
Two months after the Central Government criticised two municipalities, Vic and Torrejòn, for trying to prevent irregular migrants from registering themselves with the local authorities, a procedure known as "empadronamiento", the idea of limiting this right is gaining ground.
Sources:
- Presseurop: Spain, the new Arizona
- ABC: El PP propondrá en el Parlament que los municipios denuncien a los «sin papeles»
- El País: Robledo, acusado de negar el padrón a inmigrantes en paro
- ABC: Desestimada en Girona una moción para denunciar a empadronados sin residencia
The Municipality of Vic (in Catalonia) had unilaterally made the decision to stop registering undocumented migrants in the local civil registry (padrón). This registration is the condition to get the health card in Catalonia and in most of the Spanish regions. The government and other Spanish institutions have rapidly clarified that a measure as such is contrary to the Spanish Immigration Act and the general rules on registration of the population (empadronamiento). The municipality of Vic has explained that they did not really seek to stop registration but to increase the control on the necessary documents that undocumented migrants must submit in order to be registered and thus to obtain the health card (ID or passport and address). The Vic case has originated an extensive political debate throughout Spain about the local registration of undocumented migrants. In this context, the media has revealed that other municipalities are also developing "bad practices" as regards the local registration of this population.
Source: El País, De la Vega reprocha al alcalde de Vic que tome decisiones unilaterales y fuera de la ley, 12 January 2010.
The Spanish newspaper El País reports that the Spanish Government will propose a law allowing municipalities to refuse registration to people who live in houses which exceed a certain proportion of inhabitants per square meter. This follows the controversy which surrounded several Spanish towns' plans to refuse to register undocumented migrants. The government had previously condemned those plans, noting that in practice they will block healthcare for migrants.
Sources:
- El País, 'El Gobierno permitirá denegar el padrón por "inhabitabilidad"', 27 January 2010.
Some modifications occurred in the Spanish Aliens Act in November 2009. Amongst others, this law deems anyone agreeing to house an undocumented migrant (not living at his/her home) in order to allow the latter to be recorded in the local register to have committed a serious offence. This will have significant consequences on undocumented migrants' access to health care, as being registered in the local register (Padrón) is a sine qua non condition for having effective health care access.
On 26 June, the Spanish government sent the Immigration Bill to the Congress of Deputies, in which some improvements were made in relation to the first draft submitted for public scrutiny. For example, the new text includes a new procedure for female victims of gender-based violence through which they may be granted a temporary work permit. However, despite these modest steps forward, Médicos del Mundo (MDM Spain) is convinced that the Immigration Bill, approved by the Council of Ministers, in no way improves the protection of human rights.
http://www.mdm-international.org
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