Coronavirus on a holiday abroad: what will the insurance company pay for?
Rest in the conditions of the COVID-19 pandemic can bring not only positive impressions. If a traveler has a disease, he can be hospitalized or placed in quarantine.
What do insurers advise, and how to make your holiday in the new conditions calm and comfortable?
Traveling abroad insurance (VZR) has long been a mandatory procedure for Russians. In a COVID-19 pandemic, this rule is even more relevant.
Insurance must be issued for the reason that the costs associated with the treatment of the same COVID-19 can reach several thousand dollars depending on the country of residence, and medical transportation or evacuation is even more expensive.
The insurer assumes the settlement of medical expenses.
It will be difficult for a tourist in an unfamiliar country to find a suitable clinic to treat the problem.
The ERV notes that the medical program should, without additional options, cover the costs of outpatient and inpatient treatment for COVID-19 disease within the insured amount, and medical and transport costs, evacuation, repatriation.
Some insurance companies offer COVID-19 insurance as an extension to the main insurance program at an additional cost. This should be taken into account when concluding an insurance contract for traveling abroad.
What to do for signs of illness?
“... it is necessary to contact the service center of the insurance company by the telephone numbers indicated in the insurance policy. Based on the symptoms, location, time of day and medical protocol of the host country, the Service Center employee connects to the organization of necessary medical care. All medical manipulations are prescribed only by a doctor. If the COVID-19 test is positive, then the doctor decides whether to be hospitalized or undergo outpatient treatment/observation, but this decision is also based on the strict protocol of each individual state and locality, says Yulia Alcheeva, ERV Director.
It is important to pay attention to the list of cases covered from the insured amount: the cost of the test, medicines, hospitalization, quarantine, etc.
The issue of isolating a tourist is not in the competence of insurance companies - the procedure is according to the rules established in this country.
“The experience of recent months has largely isolated those who have been infected or who have had direct contact and are awaiting the results of their test. There are examples when parents and children are isolated together, but adults are sometimes separated or isolated only with a confirmed positive test. If the test is negative, then most tourists are not isolated, the company said.
It is necessary to realize that medical staff and representatives of state structures of the country of stay of the tourist will comply with the existing protocol (regulation).
For example, a tourist may not be allowed to retake a covid test after a positive one. Re-analysis will be done according to the prescribed protocol. Tourists waiting for the test will be sent to the institution prescribed by the regulations – a hospital, a special hotel, etc.
Features of the national protocols showed the situation with tourists in Cuba – in isolation went sick and “contact” persons. And in Turkey, mandatory isolation is provided for patients.
Experts advise tourists to take a test for COVID-19 in Russia before leaving to exclude cases when a tourist goes on vacation, and does not know that he is a carrier of the virus.
Source: atorus
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