The current pandemic has inevitably put under pressure our Healthcare System. Being the Health Insurance Card a primary personal key-tool to access Italian health services guaranteed to all citizens by Constitution (Article 32), the Italian Revenue Agency has decided to elaborate and publish a new version, in English, of the Guide on the Health Insurance Card, with the aim to ensure that all resident citizens have a quick and easy access to health services. Particularly, as stated by Ernesto Maria Ruffini, Director General of the Revenue Agency, the current publication of the Guide wants to be “….a small gesture towards all citizens to help them to request a duplicate should they need it, and explain what to do when it is lost, damaged or expiring”. Indeed, the new Guide, in its English version, is a further testimony of a growing attention of Italy’s Tax Authority towards foreign citizens presumably in difficulty with our language. Secondly, the Revenue Agency, in its efforts to improve a quicker issuing of all Health Insurance Cards requested, has actively cooperated for important technological developments. For instance, if equipped with a microchip, the health card serves as a National Services Card (CNS), and it allows access to the online services of the Public Administration. Furthermore, if personalized on the backside, it entitles the holder to receive healthcare services in every Member state of the European Union.
Where to find the new English Guide - That’s why, from today, in the tax guides section of the Revenue official website, "the Agency inform", it will be available to everyone the new English translation of the past published vademecum that describes all the possible uses of the health card and explains, briefly, how to obtain it and what to do in case of loss, theft or deterioration. Is also important to point out that this valuable translation work has been handled by the International Relations office for the exchange of work experience and benchmarking in personnel management. Said that, it’s also useful to underline how the new English instructions can be accessed even on the Agency's YouTube channel, where a video-tutorial dedicated to the topic is already available to citizens.
Contents, instructions, guidelines and advices - What is it? What do I need it for? What encloses? And if expiring. how to renew it and, above all, how to get it? These are just some examples of the questions to which the Guide provides a vast range of detailed answers. Fundamentally, the vademecum summarizes the functions of the Health Insurance Card, indicates how to get hold of it and what happens when it expires, explains how to ask for a duplicate and shows the solutions to solve many other problematic occurrences that often happen to the holders of this card, ever more essential in the citizen's daily life. The health card, in fact, has evolved and become an irreplaceable document not only to take advantage of national health services or to certify one's tax code, but also because, if activated as a Cns (Ts-Cns), it allows access, in absolute safety and in respect of privacy, to the online services of public administrations.
How to get the duplicate - There are several reasons (theft, loss, deterioration) for which it becomes necessary to ask for a duplicate. The ways change depending on whether the Health Card is without or with a microchip. In the first case, you can use the appropriate online procedure, without registration, in the Request for duplicate section of the Revenue Agency website, while in the second case, it is necessary to access the reserved area of the Agency's telematic services, which from 1 March 2021 can be visited only by using the following credentials: Spid (Public Digital Identity System), Cie (Electronic Identity Card) or Cns (National Service Charter). In any case, the taxpayer as an alternative to the online procedure. In fact, he can send the application form (model AA4 / 8), completed and signed, to an office of the Agency, via Pec or e-mail, attaching a copy of the identity document. The request can also be sent with the web service of the Health Card System portal. Another chance is to contact any agency office or your local health authority.
Stefano Latini