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Health

All citizens in Belgium have compulsory health insurance. For those foreigners who are not part of the Belgian national health system who have private health insurance in their homelands will receive documentation for the medical care and treatment that they receive in Belgium so that it can be presented to the health officials in their own country for reimbursement, wherever applicable.

Medical care and assistance is available for migrants whose papers are in order, even if they lack financial resources with the intervention of social assistants.

Urgent Medical Aid (UMA) is also available for persons staying illegally. Belgian law imposes on the CPAS to provide urgent medical aid to foreigners without resources whose stay in the country is illegal. Essential care must be shown by a medical certificate dated and issued by an approved doctor. Thanks to the attending physician, the person does not pay for the consultation. Urgent medical aid can be preventive and curative as long as it aims “to avoid a risky medical situation for the person and the person’s surroundings”.

The CPAS of the place of residence is competent for UMA. For the homeless, it is the CPAS of the local administration where the hospital is located, which usually has a network of assistants present to handle these matters.

 Hiv/aids treatment

AIDS referral centres are part of the hospital services that are attached to university institutions. They offer medical and psychological and social guidance and support for HIV-positive persons and AIDS sufferers. They are also equipped with a hotline and conduct screening.

Urgent medical aid allows those persons whose stay is illegal to have access to free-of-charge treatment to combat HIV; however, most doctors hesitate to undertake this treatment because of its conditionality because of the strong likelihood of the interruption of the treatment in the event of expulsion (forced estrangement from Belgian territory). Moreover, being recognized as being HIV-positive does not necessarily assure regularization of a person’s stay for medical reasons. The absence of inaccessibility to healthcare and treatment in your country of origin must be demonstrated. In the event of police inspections in a place of prostitution, the Foreign Office which handles the requests for regularization will be informed and might decide to expel you from Belgian territory for disturbing the public peace and order, an eventuality that does not apply to those persons who have obtained a request for residence for medical motives.