Hungarian minorities’ health-care situation in the neighbouring countries

Focusing on the Transcarpathian and Serbian minorities

Lilla Duma
English Workshop
November 2019
corrections, suggestions
Since the 4th of June 1920, the time when the Treaty of Trianon happened, a big portion of
the Hungarian people have had become minorities in the neighbouring countries as the
boundaries had been rearranged. Since then in spite of the demographic changes and the
dynamics of assimilation still quite a high number of Hungarian people live across the borders.
Romania has the largest number of ethnic Hungarians of about 1.200.000 people, Slovakia is
the second in line with about 450.000 people, in Serbia 250.000, in Ukraine 150.000
Hungarians live according to the surveys carried out / did in 2001 and 2011. Austria, Croatia
and Slovenia have smaller populations with their respective 55.000, 14.000 and 6000 numbers
of people, living there as minorities.
Because of the troubled history of the international relations in this Central-European area, it
the way Hungarian minorities are treated in the neighbouring countries is a key question. The
availability of the public health care system for these people can be considered as a good
indicator of these country’s attitudes towards their minorities. Most of the countries
surrounding Hungary – just as herself - are members of the European Union (EU) what requires
– in accordance with its Health-Care law regulations – that a certain level of health service is
to be provided to people living in the EU region. Anybody who has a permanent address in
any of the EU countries and has eligibility for health care services in one’s mother country can
apply for the Europen Health Insurance Card (EHIC) for free. If a person travels abroad in the
EU region and has some urgent health issue, this card provides a free service in public
hospitals. Serbia and Ukraine being not part of the EU, their health care system is less
controlled due to the lack of validity of EU regulations. People living here, including Hungarian
minorities, possess no eligibility as candidates for EHIC application.
In Transcarpathia and in Vojvodina besides the generally poorly organized health care for local
people Hungarians face additional difficulties in the system. For example there is the basic
language barrier posing much difficulty for elderly people in having to use the official language
when going about their business there. As assimilation and emigration has been in progress
for some time now less and less Hungarian-speaking facilities and staff are present who would
be of assistance for monolingual patients. (…) As a result of the historical and political tension
between these nations, Hungarians experience frustrating instances of negative
discrimination which just further aggravates the already existing lack of trust towards the local
public instituions and workers. These minorities tend to live in villages or smaller towns so
they are more likely to struggle with poverty. This also leads to the problem of having to cover
long distances to and from health care facilities, bad roads and the poor infrastructure in terms
of transportation of patients. These are unfortunate factors which make these people more
isolated from the appropriate health services what they might be in need of.
In the Health Law of Hungary according to the 59/2007. (XII. 29.) regulation the Hungarian
government provides opportunity for cross-border Hungarians living in Serbia and in the
Ukraine to apply for free health services in Hungary. Applicants can be those whose
permanent address is in the above-mentioned countries, who either have Hungarian
Certificate, Hungarian Relative Certificate or Hungarian citizenship. They need to fill in a so-
called Official Request Sheet, attach their medical documentation translated in Hungarian and
hand them in to a coordinator organization. In Serbia this is the Concordia Minoritatis
Hungaricae (CMH), while it’s called the Kőszikla Foundation in the Ukraine. In the relevant law
section there is a list of medical procedures and treatments which can be provided this way
for these people. These are mainly specific kinds of surgeries. If every document is present the
coordinator organization forwards it to an Evaluation Comittee, which assesses the case. If
they let the applicant apply for free service, they arrange it with the chosen health care facility.
And the cost of the medical case will be covered by the NEAK (National Healt Insurance Fund
of Hungary). If somebody would like to take this opportunity but she or he has already been
treated in Hungary, they have a chance to apply for the coverage afterwards. In this way they
might not have to pay for for the service themselves. The positive evaluation is valid within
one year, so people have to reapply if the treatment they need lasted for more than a year.
The Central Europen Service for cross-border initiatives (CESCI), this Budapest-based
organisation dealing with cross-border issues was established in 2009. With their plans what
they aim at is to strengthen cross-border communication between the nations of the Danube
region. Their projects embrace a wide spectrum of public issues. In 2018 they gave out a Legal
Access Scheme which is a detailed proposition for the cooperation between health care
facilities situated at the opposite sides of their common border. It is the existing cooperation
between the hospitals of neighboring nations along the French-Belgian and Dutch-German
borders that the organisation has taken her cue from. Basically it means that these facilities
share their resources of diagnostic and treating equipments and can send patients to each
other making the service more cost-effective and reaching the highest attainable quality in
the particular geographic area. The implementation of this has not been so reassuring here
though, in the Danube region, but there were some hope during this study in Komárom and
Komárno which are neighbouring cities by the Hungarian-Slovakian border. Their hospitals
have already had some cases based on cooperation in this sense. Hopefully, the attitude and
communication will be taken to the next level at the other borders too once this great plan
reaches fruition there.
What this research further enabled me to review is the operations of those foundations and
organizations in Transcarpathia which are primarily for Hungarian people aiming to support
their physical and mental healths. One of them is the Transcarpathian Christian Diaconial
Foundation. They help out the elderly with house chores, daily errands, nursing care and even
patient and relative education. They embrace all patients irrespective of their national
affinities / particular nationalities. What they emphasize on their website is that non-
Hungarians are as much welcome to apply for the support of the foundation. The second
example is a private outpatient clinic in Munkács called Christian Medical Centre. They have
Hungarian-speaking staff in every level of the service. Great as it is to have such a place it has
its limitations since it does not have impatient wards and if someone lives further away,
transportation can present an obstacle. The third oragnization goal is to help people who
suffer from substance abuse. It is founded by the Reformed Church there and is called
Bethesda Saving Mission for People with Substance Abuse. They attempt at getting people
to quit their addictions and proclaim the gospel to them while having these patients in their
care. Fourthly, in 2018, there were some news in the media that with Hungarian-
Transcarpathian cooperation they will build a Hungarian Hospital in Beregszász. Nevertheless,
these news, unfortunately, for the time being, can be seen as rather unfounded hearsay.
In the past decade a few aid organizations have been visiting different towns and cities in
Transcarpathia to help developing health education of the locals by planting transportable
health screening stations for specific weekends targeting children and adults also. One of them
is the Caritas, which is a Catholic aid organization. For more than 2 years now they go almost
every month - sometimes even twice a month - with a 10-20-strong medical group including
doctors, nurses and medical students. They do orthopedic, dental, eye, gynocological and
cardiological screenings. Another organization is the Student Council of Semmelweis
University which, similarly to Caritas, does health screenings at weekends and for medical
students it is a great opportunity to learn and help at the same time.
Lastly I would like to share my own experiences about a special one-week-long mission done
for Transcarpathian Hungarians living in Akli and in Szőlősgyula, off the border of Romania.
This mission has been running for more than 15 years now. An English team are delagated by
two churches situated nearby London every summer for these villages due to the partnership
between them and the local Reformed Church. Its name is Ukraine Christian Partnership
(UCP). The mission has 3 main branches. There is a school team including mostly English
teenager volunteers. They organize a fun school camp during the week for local children. A
community team visits people in their homes and support them mentally by listening to their
problems and trying to get help for them and, not least, to pray for them. And the third branch
is the medical team which at its core, includes the English doctors, a diagnostic laborant team
and some pharmacists. They bring some medication and other medical supplies which can be
handed out for patients. The diagnostic background is quite broad-spectrumed thanks to the
transportable equipment. Since they have been visiting these villages for a while now, they
can follow up patients and see if their condition is progressing not only in a longitudinal section
but in the cross-section as well. Medical students like me have the role of interpreting
between local Hungarians and the English staff and we also take the blood samples form
patients. It is a great chance for students to improve their communication and blood taking
skills let alone their English competence. These weeks are usually very busy, in the first half of
them we are in Akli while in the other we pack everything up to move to Gyula. When a patient
comes to the medical station first at a trigae desk they got their blood pressure and weight
measured and anamnesis taken. Health education in these regions is very poor. I have never
seen in my life so many high blood pressure value summed up than there in one week. What
people think in general is that it is just when they feel like or when they have headaches that
they should take their pills. They are just confused about the simplest rules of medications.
And of course this degree of compliance can be put not only down to that but also to the lack
of money. Many times they cannot even afford to buy their necessary medications. If anybody
has an urgent health issue, for example a stroke or a heart attack, the nearest hospital
happens to be 40 kms away. An additional difficulty concerns the quality of roads. There are
more potholes on those villages-roads than in a whole more economically developed country.
Travelling constitutes a real bumpy adventure everyday, but sadly not as fun as rollercoasters
though its stomach-lifting effect is totally the same. During our stay we are taken care of by
local host families. It is stunning to see these people’s lives that despite the poverty and family
life difficulties of family living - caused by emigration and the absence of husbands and fathers
because of their being abroad working for better salaries - they still maintain a very tidy, nice
and simple life. They grow what they can in their gardens and share them with each other.
Neighbors mutually help one another when somebody is in need. They live as a close
community in a positive way. Everybody who goes on these kind of missions gains a wider
perspective on life which will hopefully help generate our gratitude to look differently on what
we have in our homeland and motivation for searching for opportunities and ways of using
our skills and resources to help those who live in difficult circumstances. If we are fortunate
enough we may realize that we need their company as much as they need our help and we
are not heroes but rather pilgrims in this world who should learn not just how to bow down
to those in need but to accept their love and many times spiritual richness of these people in
return. I have been learning to embrace the idea that even if we go there to help sometimes
we come back with the feeling that they were the ones who bowed down to us and gave more
than we could bring to them.

References:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hungarian_diaspora

https://ec.europa.eu/health/policies/overview_en

https://ec.europa.eu/social/main.jsp?catId=559&langId=en

http://www.oep.hu/felso_menu/lakossagnak/ellatas_kulfoldon/az_europai_egeszsegbiztositasi_kart
ya/eu_kartya.html

https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=CELEX%3A32011L0024

EüM rendelet

http://legalaccess.cesci-net.eu/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/JOGa3_Healthcare_5.1.pdf

http://www.diakonia.uz.ua/hu/

http://refua.tirek.hu/lap/szenvedelybetegekmentomisszioja/cikk/mutat/amissziocelja/