Health Tourism - woman has 5 babies on the NHS

[BlimmingCheek]

AIBU to think that this woman is taking the bloody piss?

www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/3673011/Nigerian-mum-Bimbo-Ayelabola-flew-into-Britain-and-had-quins-on-the-NHS.html

I very much doubt she will be sent back. Who is paying her legal fees is what I would like to know?

Are we a soft touch or just a lovely compassionate country with enough resources for all?

Interesting thread. Am marking my place until I can catch up with all the posts, but just want to say that I'm writing from the same city as the lady in the article. Healthcare here is shocking - even for the wealthy. It's likely that if she hadn't gone to the UK, she and all her babies could have died or been severely damaged.

Now, who would choose to bring up a five-child family alone when your husband has abandoned you and your family is all abroad? Would some of the more critical posters on this thread like to answer that for themselves?

I'm surprised that she wasn't charged for any of her care; the women I know who have travelled to the UK for birth care have to pay £1500. Perhaps The Sun 'accidentally' omitted some details? Unlikely, I know, knowing their steadfast commitment to rigorous journalism.

Sorry, I meant 'would have died'.

We Brits are so, so, SO bloody lucky.

Now, who would choose to bring up a five-child family alone when your husband has abandoned you and your family is all abroad? Would some of the more critical posters on this thread like to answer that for themselves?

How is this womans personal circumstances the UK taxpayers problem? Why should we pay for her?!

There are millions upon millions of starving, ill people in this world. Would you like us to take all of them in, feed them and provide them all with free medical care? Where do you think the money would come from. Can the UK taxpayer fund limitless medical care for the entire world who needs it.

There I've answered that for you!

So that's a yes from you, A1980? You're a braver woman than most! Perhaps you could raise an income by making a channel five tv series: 'Raising Quints Alone'?

Now it turns out shes working illegally

bloomin' criminal

Now shes breaking the law she will definitely get to stay

Good thing we're such a rich country, otherwise we might have to make layoffs and cut services to fund these moochers

'happy for people from other countries to come over shit all over us, and use resources that should be used for our own people - '

Are you aware of the long history of British colonialism. Blimming? Do you know how colonial government worked, and that it involved mas shitting on people, theft of natural resources, etc?

Speedy, I agree -- this woman and her babies wouldn't have had a rat's chance in Nigeria.

So she can't win, eh? She can't work yet she should pay her bills?

Well this all got a bit ranty.

This woman was entitled to the care she received. Perinatal care in high risk pregnancies are regarded as emergency treatment (IIRC) and this would then fall under our obligation to treat emergencies.

As someone was asking for personal experiences, of the hundreds of pts I have seen I have never met a pure health tourist. I have met a fair few immigrants (both legal and otherwise) who have had accidents or exacerbations of chronic illnesses (that they have been taking dodgy meds sent from home for). If they are not entitled to 'full' NHS Rx, they have had their treatment altered or curtailed in some circumstances. Pts with chronic problems only receive Rx to get them over the exacerbation and then sent on. I am not naive, I am sure that there are some health tourists around but I think that their impact on the system is overplayed.

I think what has had a greater impact on our services is one the number of drugs and treatments we now have to offer and secondly peoples expectation of healthcare. The demand on A&E especially has risen due to people's unwillingness to self-medicate, belief that every minor ailment/injury should be seen and that A&E is a portal for second opinions if you don't agree with your GP or don't want to wait for an appt.

But people like this woman are an easy scapegoat - she helps to invoke an anger that can be externalised and directed towards and the government can squirm out of some of the blame and say 'no see, it's people like her that are to blame for your sick children not have a space in SCBU, your granny not getting her op in time or your dad not getting his cancer treatment quickly'. Because otherwise people would focus on the fact that the NHS as a whole is a wasteful mismanaged organisation that fritters cash like it's going out of fashion.

"now, who would choose to bring up a five-child family alone"

these are fertility treatment babies

"Are you aware of the long history of British colonialism."

Seriously - this is not a response to everything.

"My GM went through extreme poverty in the thirties, thw working class were dying in childbirth and burying their DC's, so don't be quick to put down the working class."

Mine too. My gm and gf bought up 6 boys on a council estate in Dagenham. One went on to get a PHD in maths, one went on to become a senior engineer, and my dad went on to become a fleet street journalist and then a diplomat.

But then my dad came from a working class family who valued education and READ. Go to a massive council estate and find me a 14 year old from an ordinary family who reads Dickens and broadsheet newspapers now, and I'll find you a hen with teeth. Working class culture has become so degraded. There used to be an appetite for education - there were people who did manual jobs and attended lectures on philosophy in working mens clubs in the evening. People who played instruments and knew dozens and dozens of traditional songs. My nan, who had nothing, could bake brilliantly, and sew.

Working class culture in the UK is fucked. Which is why we're turning out so many people who have so little to offer the economy. It's all X-factor, microwave meals and News of the World now.

Oh I'm getting old and ranty.

But I do tend to admire immigrants - their courage and drive. (before someone asks, yes, I do live in an area of very, very high immigration)

Awful story OP.

What a cheek!

Birdsgottafly Mon 04-Jul-11 21:27:02

"The 'priviledges' that the working class have have been fought for and not given on a plate. It is just that other countries need to catch up, we are doing them no favours by allowing them to come to the UK and not help to sort out their problems at home."

In the 19th and 20th century, a fair few British and European working class people solved their problems not by staying at home, but by emigrating to the US and Australia. We still have the ecstatic letters written home by emigrating aunt, wondering why her relatives are still putting up with the dire conditions of their home land. Friend of mine emigrated to Australia last year, again in search of a better life. Plus ca change...

I though it was strange she had 5 babies, it's got to be fertility treatment that has been too successful!

Now we pay the bill.

as somebody who has worked in the nhs for many years they are making brutal cutsleft right and centre they have beiing doing so for a number of years not just since the present government for all those who think it is fair and right that anybody can come from any where and use these services thats very compassionate of you all however you may find we dont actually have an nhs in a few years it is a frightening bullying place to work at the moment speaking as somebody who works on the frontline not behind a desk

Cory- yes i know, i have realatives all over the world. My father, as was my GF, an immigrant to the UK. The poverty that exsists globally shouldn't, we should all be fighting to change it, just because a person doesn't support these sorts of cases, doesn't make them racist, tbh with the mix in my family i would have a hard time choosing what 'race' to pick on. It was suggested that everyone who disagreed with some of the posters was a racist or had little inteligence. It seems that you have isolated that one post of mine, it follows a discussion about all of the English being lazy.

Melika- she deliberatley took double the dose of fertility treatment that is sold over the counter in Nigeria. When you read it, in all fairness, it does sound as though she was desparate to be a mum, so took the treatment and made her way here because she knew that she would get good care.

Cory- also if you look at where people migrated to, it was vast countries with dwindling populations, you cannot compare that to where immigrants are settling in places with overstreched services, now. My own family came here to fill a skills gap, as did the ones around the world, very few of my family members live in their birth country and yes they have learned the language whereever they have worked.

So she can't win, eh? She can't work yet she should pay her bills?

She's working illegally, math. She should not be here. She might get an extension on her visitor's visa, perhaps not if it's proven she's violated the constraints of the visa again. If she cannot pay her bills then she has to leave, not work.

The men who tried to drive a bomb into Glasgow airport were legally here, they were working and paying taxes as well. Britain needs more like them, eh!

Poor souls, they were just paying their bills.

Let's dismantle all borders entirely. Why force one person to go through a very expensive legitimate process when another one can come in here illegally and then go legit by pleading circumstance? How fair is that?

All Engnlish people are just feckless scroungers, especially the working class.

Who are the Engnglish, never hered of Engnland?

F*&^ng phone! English, of course.

I have reported your post for being racist, it insults people with a shared ethnic and cultural background as written in the Equality bill. I am not engaging with a racist.

'I have reported your post for being racist, it insults people with a shared ethnic and cultural background as written in the Equality bill. I am not engaging with a racist.'

LOL! Have you ever read my other posts on this thread.

It was meant tongue-in-cheek, as a response to mathanxiety's last post, which is quoted at the top although it is missing quotation marks.

PMSL!

I think this lady should be removed at the nearest possibility because she entered illegally. She abused the visitor's visa and is now going to try to use it to settle here permanently. This will make it even more difficult for everyone who needs to obtain entry clearance as a visitor to the UK.

I don't think she is our problem though.

Lachessis I agree. She should be removed immediately. It will send out the message that you can't just pop over to cash-strapped UK, have your kids at no cost to yourself and then stay here with no way of supporting yourself let alone putting money into our economy. We've been far to soft for far too long. I'm sorry that she may struggle in her home country but we can't save the world. There are millions of people around the world dying every day that wouldn't if they lived in the UK. It is only because we have the details of this case that it seems harsh to say 'tough' but that's the way it is.

There is nothing to stop her from applying for another visa to enter the UK from her home country.

But why have a UKBA at all if people come in and give it a two-fingered salute and get away with it in such a manner.

If she's working, she can't afford to live here on her own means, which are the conditions under which she entered (no recourse to public funds, no working).

What she's doing is chain migration. It's heavily discouraged in immigration law for a reason.