A hospital in Vienna cashes in EUR 500,000 each month from Romanian patients, according to Theodor Alexandrescu, director of Alico, quoted by Ziarul Financiar daily. Alexandrescu did not mention the name of the hospital.

Vienna is one of Romanians' preferred destinations for treatments or surgeries they can't have done in Romania. Romanian president Traian Basescu himself had surgery in 2006 in a Vienna hospital.  Romanian media has previously reported on the AKH, the University Hospital in Vienna, which hospitalizes around ten Romanian patients every day. A day of hospitalization in the AKH unit costs around EUR 900.

The state of the Romanian health care system has been under scrutiny recently, with the image reflected in the foreign media being that of an under-staffed and under-funded system, on the verge of collapse.

editor@romania-insider.com