Alex Trelinski
A Valencia Province man has been arrested for illegally using a friend’s health card to get emergency dental treatment.
The man, 30, went to hospital in Gandia on Sunday suffering from severe toothache.
Because he had no Spanish residency and could not access the public health system, he used somebody else’s SIP health card.
Unfortunately for him, his friend had had numerous dental procedures carried out in the last five years.
Medics took X-rays of his teeth and they were different to those they had in their medical records associated with the same name.
The patient, a Pakistani national, spoke no Spanish and medical staff questioned a friend that had come along with him to act as a translator.
He admitted that he illegally used the SIP card as he did not know whether just showing a passport would permit any treatment.
The Policia Nacional arrested the 30-year-old on a crime of usurping civil status and warned him about his legal obligation to appear in court when summonsed.
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