What happens to your health cover in Albania

In short

When you register with AIRE you leave ordinary cover under the Italian national health service. For someone who moves their residence to a country that has no healthcare convention with Italy, and Albania currently has none, the entitlement ends at the moment of deregistration from the comune and registration with AIRE.

In Albania, as a result, you organise yourself with private healthcare and insurance. For anyone between 65 and 75 this is often the most important aspect of the whole decision, more so than tax. It is worth looking at calmly before moving.

Why it happens

The national health service covers those who reside in Italy. Registering with AIRE means declaring residence abroad, and therefore leaving that group. As the Ministry of Health notes, registration with AIRE does not in itself open a right to healthcare in Italy.

The precise rule is this: Italian citizens who move their residence to a state with which Italy has no convention in force lose the right to healthcare, both in Italy and abroad, from the moment of deregistration and AIRE registration. Certain categories are an exception, such as posted workers, which do not apply to the typical case of someone retiring.

What "without a convention" means

With some non-EU countries Italy has bilateral agreements that allow, reciprocally, urgent care to be received during a temporary stay. The list includes for example Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Tunisia, San Marino and the states formed from the former Yugoslavia. Albania, to date, is not on this list.

In practice this means there is no automatic reciprocal cover between the two systems: healthcare in Albania has to be planned as a line of its own. It should be added that, even where the convention exists, it usually covers only urgent care during a temporary stay and not ordinary care: it is not your home health system following you abroad, but a limited, reciprocal protection.

When you return to Italy for a while

Once registered with AIRE you are no longer an ordinary patient of the national health service. For temporary stays in Italy there are provisions for urgent care, but they change over time and from region to region: it is worth checking them with your local health authority and not taking the same cover as before for granted.

If in future you move your residence back to Italy and re-register with the comune, you return to the national health service as before. The change, therefore, is not permanent: it follows residence.

Healthcare in Albania, in concrete terms

In Albania there is a public system, but most residents and people arriving from abroad turn to private clinics. A private specialist visit often costs a few tens of euro and generally without long waits, and that is a real advantage.

The point to budget for is another: ongoing care, more serious tests, a possible hospital stay and above all private health insurance are a recurring cost. It is the item the "low cost of living" sums often forget, and for someone over 65 it weighs.

How to prepare

Before even choosing the city or calculating the saving, it is worth considering private health cover, local or international, and doing so in good time: premiums rise with age and with pre-existing conditions. A trial stay on the ground, before the definitive move, helps you understand how access to care really works in the area you choose.

For your specific situation with the health service, the reference is your local health authority and the Ministry of Health. This guide explains the general rule and is not health or insurance advice. If you want to think it through together before deciding, write to us: sometimes it is enough to know which questions to ask.