Leaving No One Behind: Statelessness and the Sustainable Development Goals Even if private health-care services are available to stateless persons excluded from public clinics, the additional costs may be significant, as illustrated by two accounts from Thailand, a country that has a widely praised public health system (see also box (G) on page 36 below): During a visit to a private hospital in Chiang Rai city, I was very surprised to see in the waiting room two women from the village I would often visit during trips into the mountains. One of the women, who had injured her back severely while working in construction, told me that she was “fed up” with treatment at the local district hospital [maiwailaew!], and she heard that her best hope was in the city with a specialist. Her arrival at the hospital signalled her success in bypassing a number of financial and physical barriers. She had paid another villager 120 baht (one day’s wages) to drive her and wait for her in the city, brought a large portion of her savings of a few thousand baht to pay for treatment as she had not been officially referred, and, because she is not a citizen and she was not authorized to travel, she had saved an extra thousand baht in the event that she would be shaken down at a police checkpoint during her journey.86 I had an appendectomy a couple months ago. With no Thai ID, I was charged 30,000 baht ($1,000). This caused much suffering for me and my husband. If I would have had a Thai ID, then I could have received medical care for free. However, having no Thai ID, I had no better choice.87 Access to education Despite international normative statements on non-discrimination in access to education, including on the basis of statelessness,88 stateless children face difficulties in accessing education, especially beyond primary school. Lack of a birth certificate is a frequent cause of denial of access to schooling, or of the possibility of sitting exams to progress from primary to secondary school or to leave school; stateless persons are disproportionately likely not to have been registered at birth. In North Macedonia, for example, stateless Roma are excluded from school as a consequence. I have not gone to school. I went once, but when they asked for a birth certificate, I was very ashamed and left. I never went back… My life is nothing. I want to study, like this I am ashamed that they ask for a birth certificate and I do not have one. (Romani man, North Macedonia).89 86. Flaim, “No land’s man”, 174. 87. Siwarak Kitchanapaibul et al., “Status of the stateless population in Thailand: how does stigma matter in their life?”, PLOS ONE 17, no. 3 (2022): 7, https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0264959. 88. See international legal instruments listed at UNESCO webpage on the right to education: www.unesco.org/en/right-education/legalinstruments?hub=70224. Statelessness is specifically mentioned in the Abidjan Principles on the human rights obligations of States to provide public education and to regulate private involvement in education, 2019 www.abidjanprinciples.org/. 89. European Network on Statelessness, European Roma Rights Centre and Institute on Statelessness and Inclusion, “Roma belong”, 43. 32