Talk Africa found out that there are several countries in the world that offer free health services to their citizens and foreign nationals. 

An X (formerly Twitter) post claiming that no country in the entire world offers free healthcare to foreigners is FALSE. 

On 19 July 2025, Action South Africa Party Leader Herman Mashaba wrote on X that “There is no country in the entire world that offers free healthcare to foreigners. This is not an African practice, but a worldwide one.”

According to Hudson’s Global Residence Index, all but 43 countries in the world offer free or universal healthcare to at least 90% of citizens. Examples include Afghanistan, Iran, Nigeria, Yemen, and the United States.

Only one country offers healthcare that is free for everyone, including tourists: Brazil, because the nation’s constitution defines healthcare as a universal right. Brazil’s Unified Health System (SUS) offers free and universal health care, meaning it is government-funded and available to everyone in Brazil, including citizens, residents, immigrants, tourists, and even refugees. 

Australia’s Medicare, introduced in 1984, ensures access to a wide range of health and hospital services at low or no cost to Australians and some overseas visitors. 

In some countries, universal healthcare systems may be completely free of charge at the point of service, while some still require minimal or some amount of payment from patients. In countries where the government fully subsidises the public healthcare system, patients may not have to pay for their treatment at all at the point of service.

International Health Insurance indicates that Brazil, the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, Denmark, Antigua and Barbuda, Dominica, Grenada, St Kitts and Nevis, Turkey, Trinidad and Tobago, Taiwan, Suriname, Sri Lanka,, Spain, Seychelles, Serbia, Russia, The Philippines, Peru, Mauritius, Macau, Algeria, Argentina, Austria, Bahamas, Bhutan and Brunei offer free health care to its citizens and foreign nationals.  

Research done by Frontiers in Public Health’s From past to present: tracing Africa’s path to universal health coverage states that Nigeria, Gabon, Morocco, Tanzania, and South Africa are examples of countries that have taken up health insurance or are attempting to roll it out as a mechanism for moving towards Universal Health Care. 

Herman Mashaba was responding to an X post that was posted on 19 July 2025 by user @destinyzee. The post shows an African map indicating South Africa as the only country that offers free health care in Africa. Local clinics offer free health services to all residents and foreign nationals. However, health care is not entirely free in South Africa, as there are non-subsided categories for foreign nationals treated at state health facilities. 

The conversation about free health care offered to foreign nationals living in South Africa is being sparked by the ongoing calls and campaigns on blocking both legal and illegal foreign migrants from accessing health care by vigilante groups such as Operation Dudula, March and March, and the Progressive Association of South Africa. Both documented and undocumented foreign migrant women are grappling with accessing health care services in public hospitals in South Africa.

These groups are saying foreign nationals are burdening South Africa’s health system and calling for a review of the constitution that allows free health services in all state facilities. However, Section 27(1)(a) of the Constitution provides that “Everyone has the right to access healthcare services, including reproductive healthcare”. This means that everyone who resides within the borders of South Africa, whether documented or otherwise, should benefit from this right.

Section 27(1)(a) of the Constitution provides that “Everyone has the right to access healthcare services, including reproductive healthcare”. This means from the right.

African Digital Democracy Observatory, in their latest article published on 29 July 2025, Coordinated hate targets ‘The Others’ in South Africa, further unpacks the xenophobic populism, including denying babies from getting vaccines, among other services. 

TalkAfrica examined an X post claiming that no country in the entire world offers free healthcare to foreigners and found it to be  FALSE.