Travel insurance for long trips

[elanae]

A question for all you round the world sailors -

Who do you get travel insurance from? I'm just talking about medical expenses really - if you break your leg on deck or get cholera at the mouth of the Ganges...

I can't find anyone who insures over-45s for long trips (say a year), and I've heard hints that those backpacker-oriented companies exclude offshore sailing anyway.

Cheap is good.

Any ideas?

Thanks everyone.

[S/V Mother Ocean]

Well, I can't say for your case. We are lucky that we will have goverment pensions and that is a perk (for right now and what it's worth can change). We looked into AARP health insurance, it was cheapest around. One thing to consider is that health care cost outside of the USA is very cheap. Most of the doctors are well trained, and most of the specialiest are trained in the USA. Routine health care should'nt be a problem. It's the big stuff that'll get you. If you're afraid of kicking the bucket somkewhere else then stay at home. A slush fund of what you would pay out for insurance, squrriled away, could pay for just about anything that comes up. Just don't spend it on something else, then don't have it when needed. Remeber the health care industry (and it is a industry) is there to make money, not make people feel better or get them well. Healthy, well, feeling good people don't generate money for the machine. I can say that, I work in the health care industry, I' am a Paramedic for my local EMS system. I see the abuse of the system daily. Thats another topic thats not for this BB.

Dan