Travel Insurance File
Your Marketplace for Travel Insurance

Some travel insurers tell you that since not all provinces cover health services to the same extent, you should purchase travel insurance any time you leave your home province: just to be safe. For example, some provinces cover emergency ambulance fully, some cover it to a lesser extent, some not at all. Some cover services by chiropractors, physical therapists, other ancillary health providers, others don’t. Some cover certain drugs out of hospital, others don’t. So what should you do? It depends on your tolerance for risk. First of all understand that if you need emergency medical services in another province they will very likely be provided in a hospital. If not, you would probably travel home to be taken care of. And according to the portability provision of Canada’s medicare, almost anything that is medically necessary and is provided in hospital will be covered no matter which province you are in. In that case, maybe your ambulance ride may not be fully covered, or maybe your initial visit to a clinic may not be eligible, or some drug you were prescribed before you went to hospital might not be covered. But that’s about as bad as it’s going to get.

Insurance is usually seen as a safeguard against major loss that would really hurt you financially. So if you lie awake worrying about the possibility of losing $300 or $400 in some unforeseen accident, then maybe you should buy insurance. On the other hand you may not consider paying $100 to protect against the possibility that you might lose $300 somewhere down the road a good deal? That’s your call. But first, do the math.