Little money, long distances: there are Romanians who haven't seen a doctor in over a decade

In some areas of Romania, people go years without seeing a doctor — sometimes more than a decade — because they cannot afford the travel costs and because the nearest hospital is tens of kilometres away. For people living in rural areas, a trip to the doctor means spending money on transport and losing an entire day's work.

Tanti Tanța, one of the residents of Cozieni commune, Buzău County, says she has not been to hospital in 8 years, and the last time she went was because she had broken her leg. "There's no money... If you don't have children to drive you, you'd have to pay for a car to get to Buzău and deal with all of that — it's just not worth it. It means spending your entire pension on the journey, and then what do you do until next month? You've got nothing to eat," she explains.

Cozieni commune has just over 1,700 residents. Some of them have never seen a doctor for routine check-ups. One local woman shares her story: "I've had diabetes for 15 years. We can't manage it — my pension is 1,280 RON. It's complicated to go to the doctor because we don't have the money. We just carry on until we collapse." Other villagers say they have not had a medical consultation in over 10, or even 10 to 15 years.

A free medical caravan supporting the community

To help local residents, Red Cross volunteers organised a caravan offering free consultations in the commune, which was attended by over 300 people. "Medical tests are carried out with on-the-spot results — we have the results within 15 to 20 minutes at most. We also have a biologist here. At the first caravan, ECGs were also performed, and blood pressure was measured," explained Floarea Bîrzu, director of the Buzău Red Cross branch.

The doctors involved in the caravan noted that many of the patients they saw presented with serious health conditions that were difficult to treat due to how long they had been left unaddressed. Ophthalmologist Alexandru Gheorghe noted: "People over 70 who have never had an eye examination come in with serious ocular conditions that, in general, can no longer be corrected with glasses — in most cases, they require ophthalmological follow-up and even surgical intervention."

According to data cited in the report, Romanians visit a doctor an average of 5.8 times per year, whilst in other European countries the average exceeds 10 consultations annually.