After more than a year, pensioners and persons over the age of 65 will once again have the right to reimbursement for travel expenses when visiting a doctor in another city. This reimbursement had been withdrawn to them since the beginning of last year, following the introduction of the free train travel initiative for pensioners and older persons.
While the project itself was welcome, it had negative consequences for pensioners and older individuals. It was assumed that since they could travel by train for free, they no longer had transportation expenses when seeking medical treatment. As a result, they were not eligible for travel cost reimbursement—even though the train was often an inadequate means of transport due to schedules, the distance from healthcare institutions, and patients’ health conditions.
Ombudswoman Tena Šimonović Einwalter repeatedly warned the Government of the Republic of Croatia over the past year that this constituted discrimination against older persons and pensioners, and urged that their right to this reimbursement be restored. This change is now set to happen, as reflected in the Draft Proposal for Amendments to the Mandatory Health Insurance Act, which was presented at a government session on April 16, 2025. The Ombudswoman’s proposal that the right to reimbursement and the amount thereof be based on the actual kilometres traveled—rather than the price of a public transportation ticket—was also accepted. Distance will now be calculated from the patient’s address to the address of the healthcare institution, rather than between towns or cities, which often did not reflect the true distance patients had to travel.
The Ombudswoman welcomes the acceptance of this proposal, which removes the discrimination older citizens had complained to her about. She emphasizes that this change sends a clear message to the public: it is worthwhile to raise concerns when they feel their rights are being denied or when they are being discriminated against.
She also calls on the Ministry of Health to accept other proposals she submitted during the public consultation on the amendments to the Mandatory Health Insurance Act, as part of the ongoing parliamentary procedure, in which she will participate through sessions of the parliamentary committees in the Croatian Parliament. Among other things, she will advocate for reducing the minimum distance required to claim reimbursement from 50 to 30 kilometres, and for a revision of the calculation method to ensure that patients are not reimbursed less than the cost of a public transportation ticket.
She will also advocate for measures to prevent situations where students studying abroad lose their mandatory health insurance, to ensure access to health insurance for homeless persons without a registered residence, to allow employees to take sick leave to care for older family members, and to completely abolish the requirement for regular in-person reporting to the Croatian Health Insurance Fund (HZZO)—a requirement that caused thousands of people to lose their health insurance coverage. As a reminder, following the introduction of this in-person attendance requirement, the Ombudswoman submitted a request in June 2023 to the Constitutional Court to review the constitutionality of the relevant provision of the Mandatory Health Insurance Act. The Court has not yet issued a decision on the matter.