Repatriated Greeks
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For the largest part of the 19th and 20th centuries Greece has been a net exporter of labor force. However gradually from the 1970s the inflow of Greeks repatriating started to change this picture. In the decade from 1970 to 1980 it is estimated that 330.000 Greeks repatriated, among them 30.000-40.000 political refugees from the ex-Soviet countries. Political refugees are the ones who faced most hardships in adjusting in that period, with most of them already at an old age, often with no significant means.
At the end of 1980s, from 1988 primarily, an unexpected wave of Greeks from the ex-Soviet Union, most of them with origin from Pontos (Pontic Greeks - who have been living around the Black Sea for many centuries) took place. It was followed in the beginning of the 1990s by an inflow of Greeks from Southern Albania (the region of "North Eipiros"), following the collapse of that regime as well. It is calculated that from 1988 to 2000 more than 150.000 national Greeks came to Greece.
Repatriated Greeks face a favourable regime in terms of access to public services including health care services. Special institutions have been created also to facilitate the inclusion of these groups in Greek society, like the National Foundation for the Reception and Restitution of Repatriated Greeks, the Greek Church Center for the Support of Repatriated Greeks and several reception centers that operated primarily in the 1990s.
The favourable provisions for repatriated Greeks involve:
- social welfare health insurance that provides with free access to the public health system.
- social insurance with the Farmers' Social Insurance Fund for the uninsured who are older than 65 years of age (Article 48, Law 2084/1992) and a special account for self insurance with IKA (the largest Social Insurance Fund) (Article 36, Law 1902/1990).
- Provision of emergency financial assistance from the Ministry of Employment and settlement reliefs from the Ministry of Health.
