The patients, some of them with companions, started to check-in at Lisbon Airport early, with several suitcases and other packaged belongings, some of whom after years of stay in Portugal, where they came to do treatments from which the national health did not have.
Representatives of the Angolan health system and other citizens who took advantage of this humanitarian flight to return, after being stranded in Portugal due to the measures adopted by the Portuguese executive to combat the covid-19, also travel with these patients.
These patients did not want to make statements to the Lusa agency, showing themselves nervous about the time of boarding a flight back to the country that they left for health reasons.
While in Portugal they benefited from the agreements between Angola and Portugal, which allow these patients to enjoy treatments in Portuguese health services, in addition to accommodation and a subsidy, the value of which varied.
However, the medical board of Angola in Portugal ended in February, which presupposes the end of support for patients who have, meanwhile, been discharged.
According to the Government, before the closure of this medical board, 385 citizens were in Portugal, including patients and companions. The closure of the board followed an audit that assessed patients and reported "several abuses in the use of this mechanism".
According to the Executive, during the time of the medical team of the collaboration between Angola and Portugal, 9360 patients were assisted, supported by 5250 companions, which will have cost the State around six million euros per year.
The average cost of accommodation and treatment, per patient, is between 2700 euros and 2900 euros per month, to which the companion's stay costs are added.
Official government source told Lusa that the 27 patients who returned this Monday will join the 17 who had already chosen to return, by their own means, because their health situation was resolved.
However, they return with medicines for three months and scheduled appointments for review in Portugal.
The same source said that there were still 47 patients and 20 companions who will continue to receive support from the State until they return, which should happen until the end of the year.
The other approximately 100 patients who chose not to return will be left on their own and will not have the support of the State, neither for the payment of the room in the pension where they still live, nor for expenses.
This source said that the patients who have now returned have pathologies that had no treatment in Angola at the time they went to Portugal, but that, in the meantime, the Angolan health system started to make available.
The health cooperation agreement between Angola and Portugal remains in force and, therefore, whenever an Angolan needs treatment that has no response in Angolan services, he will be transferred to Portugal, at the expense of his country.
This return has been contested by several Angolan patients who say they have not been discharged and who claim that they still need medical care in Portugal.
Several of them are waiting for a transplant or undergoing specific hemodialysis, as well as cancer treatments that they say do not exist in Angola.
In recent months, these patients have held several demonstrations in Lisbon, complaining about the delay in the payment of subsidies and against the announcement of the return to Angola, after the end of the medical board.
