The West Bengal government has now taken an official decision to no longer offer free treatment facilities to international patients in state-run hospitals.
The state health department issued a formal notification regarding this charge on Saturday.
Sources in the department said audit officials recently learned that huge amounts of money were going out of the state treasury due to free treatment offered every year to thousands of foreign patients, most of whom are from neighboring Bangladesh.
The notification says that any foreign patient coming to a government hospital for emergency treatment will have to pay a certain amount as treatment fee.
In the case of treatments covered by the state government’s health insurance plans, the fees that foreign patients must pay will be equivalent to the amount set for the treatments.
