The Perils of Getting Sick Aboard a Cruise Ship

I am always looking for ways to educate my customers on the incredible benefit of travel protection insurance. Here is a fantastic post from Anne Campbell in her Cruising Blog. Please take heed of this valuable information.

Today on the Cruise Log, journalist Gene Sloan cites a report of a man getting kicked off a Carnival ship in Roatan, Honduras because he was sick. The unfortunate passenger had to pay thousands of dollars to get himself home in order to get the medical care he needed.

That’s the way all cruise lines handle passengers who are too ill to be treated by the ship’s medical staff. If you have travel insurance you’ll be lifted by air ambulance to the nearest U.S. or, if the distance is too great, best hospital in the region. If you don’t have travel insurance you can either pay $20,000 for an air ambulance or go to a local hospital.

This is why I believe you’re very foolish to travel anywhere outside the U.S. without purchasing travel insurance.

My father came down with the flu aboard Queen Elizabeth 2, spent days in bed with a nurse checking in on him frequently. If you come down with a virus like Norwalk, you’ll be confined to your cabin until you’re no longer contagious. Ships can handle viruses, a scraped knee and sunburn but little else.

Ships aren’t equipped to handle serious illness. There are no diagnostic tools, surgery or intensive care. While there is medicine for sea sickness and flu, not much else is available. Ships do have CPR machines but beyond temporarily stabilizing someone who suffers a heart attack, the staff can do little more.

A ship’s physician told me about a passenger whose life was saved because he had travel insurance. A passenger suffered a stroke and because he had travel insurance, the ship’s doctor was immediately patched through to a neurologist in Houston. An air ambulance quickly evacuated the passenger, taking him to a Texas hospital where he was successfully treated. However, if he hadn’t had insurance, the ship’s doctor would have had no choice but to put him ashore in the nearest port, Cartagena, Columbia, where, the doctor believed, he would have died.

I don’t know about you, but to me the thought of getting sick and being forced to go to a Third World hospital is terrifying.

Here’s another insider’s tip: Should the ship’s doctor make a misdiagnosis or provide poor treatment, forget trying to sue. Like the spa and gift shop, doctors and nurses are independent contractors. The cruise line doesn’t hire doctors and nurses; they are employed by outside employment agencies. Hence, the cruise line has no liability.

I hope I’ve scared you enough to get travel insurance before your next cruise. My favorite company is Travel Guard which you may purchase online or through travel agents.

Do you buy travel insurance? Have you ever had to use it?