Air evacuation from ship-to-shore insurance.

[swifty]

On the August 15th Alaska cruise on the Ruby, a passenger with a medical emergency had to be evacuated from the ship by helicopter.  My understanding is that the cost of this is around $25000.  Do any insurances cover  ship-to-shore transportation?

 

[beg3yrs]

Coast Guard evacuations are at no cost to the patient. Really! True! Fact!

[Rick&Jeannie]

Agreed...CG evacs are not supposed to be "chargeable"...at least to the patient.  IDK what they do about traveling partners.

[mellon1]

What insurance covers getting from an island of port to USA?  Evac???  Interested in buying that insurance.  Thanks.

[Rick&Jeannie]

MedJet Assist (not insurance)

medjet.com

[hawk/hornfan]

Not on cruise, but at home about 3 years ago. A helicopter ride of about 70 miles was $33,000. Insurance paid all but $1600. I retired 2 months later.

[AZjohn]

3 hours ago, hawk/hornfan said:

Not on cruise, but at home about 3 years ago. A helicopter ride of about 70 miles was $33,000. Insurance paid all but $1600. I retired 2 months later.

And there is a perfect reason to have good medical insurance. Too many people think it will never happen to them.

 

It just takes one time having to stay in the hospital for a week and see the bill to say man, it’s been worth paying the $ all this time time for insurance (speaking of personal experience). If I had a serious medical issue on a cruise there is no doubt I want insurance to get me back to the US for medical treatment (getting off soap box now☺️).

 

Cheers

[sultan_sfo]

1 hour ago, AZjohn said:

...

If I had a serious medical issue on a cruise there is no doubt I want insurance to get me back to the US for medical treatment (getting off soap box now☺️).

 

Cheers

Actually the process is a bit more complicated.

Even MedJet is just Hospital to Hospital.

 

One Actual Scenario:

When Princess dis-embarks a PAX at some port, Princess has connections with a local hospital.

 

If the pax's medical status is serious (eg cannot be flown immediately to home-port),

Princess arranges the pax to be admitted to the local hospital.

 

Once the pax is hospitalized at that port, one of 2 events are required (MedJet or no MedJet).

The hospital has to certify that the patient is stable to be discharged from that local

hospital and can be put on a flight home. Or that port hospital must be satisfied that the pax is stable and has been given admission to another hospital. Then either using MedJet or Air Ambulance the transfer is allowed. Admissions to a US hospital requires the pax's physician to arrange the admission to the US hospital.

Edited September 13, 2023 by sultan_sfo

[MacMadame]

Depending on your insurance, they might not fly you home either but to the nearest acceptable hospital. This happened to a friend of mine and they had to pay for the flight home themselves even though it ended up being cheaper to do that than to go to the "nearest" acceptable hospital.

[JG&Lcruisingnewbies]

I’m actually confused by the responses. In the UK I’ve been told by every cruise line and my TA our insurance HAS to cover medical evac as well as all other medical expenses.

 

Cruise insurance for USA residents doesn’t have to include it? Do they expect your personal medical insurance to cover it?

 

Princess insist that for UK residents we have cover of up to £2million minimum for medical costs including evac, Covid, & repatriation, Doesn’t matter where we are going or where from.

 

most European countries have some form of healthcare provided at a discount or ‘free’  to UK residents and if I was picked up by a UK helicopter ambulance or coastguard, I wouldn’t be charged at all but they still say £2 million & evac 
 

our annual travel insurance covers more than that. I just assumed the minimum requirements was the same everywhere. (Obviously allowing for USD to GBP conversion on the minimum amounts)

[MissP22]

.

[chengkp75]

On 9/11/2023 at 8:14 PM, swifty said:

On the August 15th Alaska cruise on the Ruby, a passenger with a medical emergency had to be evacuated from the ship by helicopter.  My understanding is that the cost of this is around $25000.  Do any insurances cover  ship-to-shore transportation?

 

Under the IMO's SAR (Search and Rescue) Convention, certain nations take on responsibility for SAR activities around their coasts, and this is done for no charge to the person rescued/evacuated, nor to the ship or company.  The USCG takes this responsibility for our coasts, and large swaths of the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, as well as most of the Gulf of Mexico and Caribbean.

 

Commercial Life Flight helicopters do not train in either winch operations, nor in winching/landing on moving ships, so no Captain would allow these flights anywhere near their ships.  Some European nations contract out their SAR responsibilities to commercial companies, but these are then trained for maritime operations, just like the governmental agencies.

[AZjohn]

1 hour ago, JG&Lcruisingnewbies said:

Cruise insurance for USA residents doesn’t have to include it? Do they expect your personal medical insurance to cover it?

Question 1: No, and many US citizens do not purchase cruise/Holiday insurance

Question 2: Who knows what they are thinking because almost all regular health insurance will not cover outside of country. I believe many of them just feel they will never have a medical emergency on their cruise/Holiday??

 

And here is the kicker, as many as 27.5 million US residents do not have regular health insurance for home either. There is no mandate here in the US you must have medical insurance and the government does not provide free coverage either.

 

Sad situation IMHO.

 

Cheers

[JG&Lcruisingnewbies]

1 hour ago, AZjohn said:

Question 2: Who knows what they are thinking because almost all regular health insurance will not cover outside of country. I believe many of them just feel they will never have a medical emergency on their cruise/Holiday??

I was thinking more about what Princess are thinking, rather than what an individual is thinking- but I definitely see your points.

private companies like Princess can really stick whatever they want in the T & C’s. 
So the fact they insist on Europeans having travel insurance AND Insist on the amount & items covered, yet don’t do the same for American citizens is just bizarre to me to be honest.

 

it’s true they don’t check our policy in detail. Just want a name & number of the company for the medical care. But it’s in the T & Cs.

 

The thought of us not having travel insurance makes me pretty scared tbh. We’ve had to claim on it a few times for pre holiday cancellations for both Pandemic & personal medical emergency reasons. and also a small medical issue during a cruise. without it we’d be down thousands of £ which we can’t afford.
 

paying for healthcare and evac in an emergency, Especially if I was outside Europe, may well make us bankrupt. 

That said I don’t know what it costs for travel insurance including medical in the USA if I was to compare like for like. 
 

just one short appointment with a ships dr for our then 5yr old & 3 days of tablet antibiotics given on the ship for a bad ear infection cost $500 5 years ago (who knows what now?!) and instead cost £50 excess.

 

The ships medical care was very good. Complaints not with them at all. We were all warned how expensive it is.

[Babr]

4 hours ago, JG&Lcruisingnewbies said:

I’m actually confused by the responses. In the UK I’ve been told by every cruise line and my TA our insurance HAS to cover medical evac as well as all other medical expenses.

 

Cruise insurance for USA residents doesn’t have to include it? Do they expect your personal medical insurance to cover it?

 

Princess insist that for UK residents we have cover of up to £2million minimum for medical costs including evac, Covid, & repatriation, Doesn’t matter where we are going or where from.

 

most European countries have some form of healthcare provided at a discount or ‘free’  to UK residents and if I was picked up by a UK helicopter ambulance or coastguard, I wouldn’t be charged at all but they still say £2 million & evac 
 

our annual travel insurance covers more than that. I just assumed the minimum requirements was the same everywhere. (Obviously allowing for USD to GBP conversion on the minimum amounts)

The confusion lies in the definition of terms. Yes, US travel policies cover medical evacuation. That means hospital-to-hospital transfer if it is determined to be medically necessary. It does not mean air / sea rescue as explained by  @chengkp75 in post #12.

 

Nor does it mean repatriation. The patient is usually treated at the nearest appropriate facility until he is able to return home by commercial air. A medical escort is provided if necessary. 
 

The thing to know is that the doctors and the insurance company make the decisions. MedJet Assist allows you to have more control over the decision; but it, too, is for hospital-to-hospital transfer, and there are still some limitations.

[AZjohn]

1 hour ago, JG&Lcruisingnewbies said:

That said I don’t know what it costs for travel insurance including medical in the USA if I was to compare like for like. 

The cost I pay for travel insurance (NOT through Princess) is around 8% of total trip costs (cruise, air, hotels, etc.). Some pay a little more or less I would guess.

 

Cheers

[Babr]

5 minutes ago, AZjohn said:

The cost I pay for travel insurance (NOT through Princess) is around 8% of total trip costs (cruise, air, hotels, etc.). Some pay a little more or less I would guess.

 

Cheers

Third-party policies use age, length of trip, and amount insured among factors determining cost of the premium so it gets more expensive as one ages unlike cruise line policies which are based on a percentage of fare.

 

[Pickels]

Check out InsureMyTrip; lots of insurance policies to review/select. 

[JG&Lcruisingnewbies]

24 minutes ago, Babr said:

The confusion lies in the definition of terms. Yes, US travel policies cover medical evacuation. That means hospital-to-hospital transfer if it is determined to be medically necessary. It does not mean air / sea rescue as explained by  @chengkp75 in post #12.

 

Nor does it mean repatriation. The patient is usually treated at the nearest appropriate facility until he is able to return home by commercial air. A medical escort is provided if necessary. 
 

The thing to know is that the doctors and the insurance company make the decisions. MedJet Assist allows you to have more control over the decision; but it, too, is for hospital-to-hospital transfer, and there are still some limitations.

Thank you for explaining that.

 

Im not understanding why Princess USA doesn’t tell you that you MUST have travel insurance though.They tell us here in the UK. Ask for the name and telephone number of the insurance company. Don’t add it, check in won’t happen & you don’t get on the ship.

[ldubs]

43 minutes ago, AZjohn said:

The cost I pay for travel insurance (NOT through Princess) is around 8% of total trip costs (cruise, air, hotels, etc.). Some pay a little more or less I would guess.

 

Cheers

 

We migrated to an annual travel medical policy.  Found the annual premium to be less than purchasing separate policies.  

[Rick&Jeannie]

While I am the one who offered up MedJet Assist when asked about air evac...it is NORT the only travel insurance that we have.  We always take the cruise line insurance (more so for the "trip protection" angle than for medical) and we also have an annual international medical coverage policy from GeoBlue Trekker. Many will say that we are "insurance poor"...but I'd rather have it that way than to not have it when we REALLY need it!

[ldubs]

3 minutes ago, JG&Lcruisingnewbies said:

Thank you for explaining that.

 

Im not understanding why Princess USA doesn’t tell you that you MUST have travel insurance though.They tell us here in the UK. Ask for the name and telephone number of the insurance company. Don’t add it, check in won’t happen & you don’t get on the ship.

 

I'm totally guessing here, but suspect it is because the UK has different/stricter laws protecting travelers.  In the U.S., it is basically an individual decision.  

[Rick&Jeannie]

4 minutes ago, JG&Lcruisingnewbies said:

Thank you for explaining that.

 

Im not understanding why Princess USA doesn’t tell you that you MUST have travel insurance though.They tell us here in the UK. Ask for the name and telephone number of the insurance company. Don’t add it, check in won’t happen & you don’t get on the ship.

I agree...doesn't seem right, but then there are other things involving "other countries" that are very different from the US.  I can't explain it other than I assume it involves governmental regulations.  Why else would they make it hard on themselves in "tracking" what people need from different countries?

[JG&Lcruisingnewbies]

43 minutes ago, AZjohn said:

The cost I pay for travel insurance (NOT through Princess) is around 8% of total trip costs (cruise, air, hotels, etc.). Some pay a little more or less I would guess.

 

Cheers

Thank you.

 

We pay £240 ($300 USD) per year for annual cover that covers all three of us (2 adults one child), home and abroad.

 

I’m pretty good at reading the small print on insurance. I know what I’m covered for & it’s well over Princesses edict. We couldn’t be away for more than 28 days at a time (we wish!) on this policy but otherwise we’re covered for medical, theft, items going missing, cancellations outside of our control, like bad weather or pandemics.

one pre existing condition is covered & we’re in our 40’s. We know as we get older that will increase. And ditto if we need to add more pre existing conditions too.

 

8% of the cost of our last cruise for all three of us is much more than we pay for the whole year.

I’m sure some pay less and some pay more & I know comparisons are hard because there are so many external factors affecting cost.

to us, 8% feels like a lot though.

[ontheweb]

1 hour ago, Babr said:

Third-party policies use age, length of trip, and amount insured among factors determining cost of the premium so it gets more expensive as one ages unlike cruise line policies which are based on a percentage of fare.

 

And it does unfortunately get progressively more expensive as you get older.