The percentage of tourists admitted to hospital is comparatively low.

The percentage of tourists admitted to hospital is comparatively low.

Majorca Daily Bulletin reporterPalma19/08/2017 00:00
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The Balearic health service, IB-Salut, expects to this year invoice a total of fifty million euros for attention given to tourists. Thirty million will be for tourists with the EU health insurance card. Twenty million is billed to third party insurers and includes health care for traffic and sporting accidents as well as for non-EU visitors. The fifty million this year will represent a rise of five million over 2016.

In 2016 the billing for the EU card was 27 million, which was a significant increase on the 2015 figure of 21.9 million. In 2014 it had been 21 million. By nationality, and hardly unexpectedly, UK and German tourists place greater demand on the islands' health service than tourists from other countries: 36% of bills are for UK visitors and 28% are for Germans. Respectively, these correspond to 14,900 and 11,600 cases. Billing to third parties was 18 million euros in 2016.

Son Espases Hospital accounts for 42% of the total invoiced amount. Can Misses in Ibiza represents 13%, while Manacor and Son Llàtzer are both 10%. In 2016 the health service dealt with 48,356 cases. Only six per cent of these required hospital admission.

The general secretary of IB-Salut, Manuel Palomino, bases the figures for this year on the amounts billed up to the end of July. Apart from the actual number of tourists, he says that increased billing is due to improvements in management processes and invoicing procedures by health centres.