After winning a bronze medal at the Paris Summer Olympics women’s rugby sevens on Tuesday, July 30, Ariana Ramsey stayed in Paris to take in the sights, watch other athletes compete in competitions — and also schedule a year’s worth of medical appointments in the free polyclinic in the Olympic village.
The two-time Olympian described her experience on TikTok and explained her shock when she learned that all athletes have free healthcare while competing during the Summer Games.
“Not only do we have free food in the Village, but we also have free dental and free healthcare,” Ramsey, 24, revealed to her followers in a clip posted on TikTok, alongside which she wrote: “I literally love it here. The Olympic Village way has free health care.”
She added in the video, “I literally just got a free Pap smear and I have a dentist appointment and an eye exam next week. As?”
In another TikTok video, Ramsey shared that she received free new glasses after her vision exam. “I have 20/20 vision, but they gave me glasses because I told her that my vision gets blurry sometimes. Now I have glasses – she said showing her new frames.
In all, Ramsey says she had a Pap smear, eye exam, new glasses and a dental exam during her stay at the Olympic Village.
According to Olympics.com, the Olympic Village hosts 14,250 athletes during the Olympic Games and 8,000 during the Paralympic Games.
“According to the Paris 2024 organizing committee, the Village also offers cardiology, orthopedics, physiotherapy, psychology, podiatry and, of course, sports medicine—all free of charge for athletes,” Sports Illustrated he reported, adding that the Paralympians will also have access to dermatologists once they move into the space next week.
Exit too reported that the Olympic Village has offered athletes and their delegations free health care since the 1932 Los Angeles Games, although many are unaware that they have access to such facilities. The Olympic polyclinic can receive as many as 700 patient visits per day.
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PEOPLE reached out to Team USA’s Olympic Village for more information on American athletes’ access to the health options available in lodging.
While speaking with PEOPLE, Team USA Olympic Village Director Daniel Smith said the American athletes “have a full sports medicine clinic with 22 providers, massage therapy, cold tubs, the works.”
He added that there is an athlete resource center, which “provides a lot of mental health resources for athletes as well. We have in-house mental health providers. We have in-house sports dietitians who make smoothies and provide all kinds of dietary supplements for athletes.”
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Ramseys original video has since received 140k views and has been picked up by local French news outlets. In another update, she said her eye doctor recognized her from her TikTok and many medical professionals thanked her for raising awareness about Village facilities.
Since then, she’s received messages from other athletes who didn’t know about the free health care and said her videos encouraged them to visit the clinic. She has since changed her TikTok bio to describe herself as “Advocate for Universal Free Healthcare😁.”
“The fact that I’m so excited to get free dentistry is crazy,” Ramsey said in the following video. “This will be my new fight for action – free healthcare in America.”
Elsewhere on TikTok, Ramsey shared her gratitude for the medical approach. “Say hello to the health workers at the Olympic Village. You are amazing and we thank you so much for your service,” she captioned a video of herself alongside some of the medical workers.
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To find out more about all the Olympic and Paralympic hopefuls, come to people.com and check out the live coverage before, during and after the games. And sign up for Going for Gold, our Olympic newsletter, to deliver the biggest stories from the Games straight to your inbox. Watch the Paris Olympics and Paralympics starting July 26 on NBC and Peacock.
Categories: Trends
Source: HIS Education