Annual travel insurance Some alarming statistics
Statistics relating to public understanding of the need for single or yearly travel insurance are truly terrible.
That means a large number of people leave the UK every year without proper cover – and the results can be disastrous.
Terrible facts
Regardless of the government’s efforts and the insurance industry to draw people’s attention to the importance of travel insurance:
• Almost a quarter of all people travel out of the UK without insurance • That number increases by almost 50% for people in the 15-24 year age group.
To understand why these numbers should be alarming, keep in mind that on 2011/12:
• Every day, an average of 10 UK people are hospitalized while abroad
Why Do People Not Take Closures?
There is no definite answer to the question but it is possible to draw two definite conclusions. Annual travel insurance Some alarming statistics
First, higher statistics in the 15-24 age range indicate that young people may suffer the invincible illusion of youth and the syndrome “will never happen to me”. Unfortunately, they are too often wrong.
That’s especially true for this age group, as they are most likely to exercise strenuous sports, hazardous sports or related activities.
A second and more worrying cause is the false belief that the European Health Insurance Card (EHIC) provides ‘free health insurance’. Almost 20% of all age groups consider that the problem.
In fact, apart from only one or two non-EU European countries with affiliates, EHIC does not cover any other country outside the EU. Even in the EU country, EHIC covers only medical expenses that can also be free from local residents in the country itself. Therefore, it will not cover such things as medical repatriation, additional hotel and flight costs for health care providers etc.
The falsely linked assumption of about 17% of travelers without a single trip or annual travel insurance is that somehow the UK government will pay for their medical repatriation, if that need arises. That is not the case at all and even if the government does help, they may take legal action to return the money from you once back in England.
Cost Annual travel insurance Some alarming statistics
The above statistics are alarming in themselves, but it is even more alarming because of poor awareness of how expensive medical care abroad.
In the United States, for example, major surgery and medical care can easily generate bills that reach hundreds of thousands of pounds – or even millions in extreme cases. It is not often recognized that in some situations, some countries may refuse to provide medical assistance to you unless you can indicate that you have the means to pay for it – usually a single or annual travel insurance.
Conclusion
The current level of misunderstanding regarding the risks and potential costs of medical care abroad coupled with significant confusion regarding the role of EHIC causes a large number of British people to travel abroad each year with little or no cover.
This must be resolved as soon as possible through some form of publicity campaign that is relaunched.
A single travel insurance, family or good travel insurance is usually not expensive and is a small price to pay for peace of mind.
Patrick Chong is the Managing Director of InsureMore, an award-winning specialist team in a single global travel and annual travel insurance policy. In addition to offering attractive offers for travel insurance, Patrick also collects and shares the best free travel competitions to help his clients get the most out of their holiday. Annual travel insurance Some alarming statistics