Recent cases where European
hospitals have refused to take EHIC cards highlight the need for travel insurance.
When most Brits jet off for
their summer holidays, the chances are they’re too busy planning which sights
to visit first to think too much about insurance. Especially if you’re
travelling within Europe, the free European Health Insurance Card (EHIC) is
there to make sure they can access healthcare across the Union, isn’t it?
Well, as the recent fiasco in
Spain has proven, it doesn’t always work like that. The European Commission has
just announced that it plans to take legal action against Spain over instances
where Spanish hospitals have refused British tourists with only an EHIC.
Anecdotal evidence has
suggested that some couriers and taxi drivers have even been offered deals to
take patients to facilities which do not accept the card, while other
travellers claim to have been asked for credit card details before they were
treated, as well as their travel insurance information.
Even at facilities that refused
the EHIC, travel insurance was accepted - but those who did not have a separate
policy could well have faced hefty bills.
It’s one thing if a hospital is
clearly breaking the rules, but travellers are not always aware of what the
EHIC covers. Research from a leading comparison website showed that nearly half
of Brits thought their EHIC gave them free emergency medical care anywhere in
Europe, while six per cent thought it offered the same access to emergency
treatment anywhere in the world.
In fact, the card entitles
travellers to the same level of state medical care that is offered to that
country’s citizens. In many countries, this will mean that treatment is free,
but in others this will simply lead to reduced costs. Should you be faced with
any medical bills to pay yourself, travel insurance could save you from an
unexpected cost.
The card is not strictly
limited to the EU, but applies across the European Economic Area (EEA) - which
means that travellers to Norway, Switzerland and Iceland can still reap the
benefits. However, some tourists have tried to use their cards in Turkey as
well, where the cards are not accepted because the country does not belong to
the EEA.
Should tourists find themselves
in need of emergency care, there is no guarantee that an ambulance will travel
to a state-run facility. Medical centres in many holiday resorts are also
privately run, meaning that EHIC will be of little use.
But the research also found
that holidaymakers were misled on their entitlement to some of the most
expensive services. If something extremely serious was to happen to a tourist,
nearly a tenth of UK passengers thought that their EHIC would entitle them to
be flown home by air ambulance for medical help in Britain.
This is not the case - EHIC
does not come with any entitlement to repatriation if you’re taken seriously
ill. Without travel insurance to cover the cost, flying home by air ambulance
could set you back thousands. The researchers heard from one insurer that
flying a patient back from the Canary Islands had cost as much as £23,000.
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