Price of health insurance seemed unrealistically low
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I nearly choked on my cornflakes as I read that the government's answer to the problem of foreigners unable to pay their hospital bills is to impose a 500 baht compulsory insurance when they apply for their visa at Thai consulates worldwide.
Given that individual medical treatment for road accidents and heart attacks here can run into hundreds of thousands, or even millions of baht each, I’d very much like to meet an insurer ready to pick up the tab for such a paltry sum.
There’s also a problem with increasingly-ageing retirement visa holders who came here when the baht was weak and living costs much cheaper. Many, now, can’t afford proper medical cover and are simply hoping for the best when it comes to their own terminal decline. The reality is that the government has made it just too easy for those 50-plus to obtain long-stay visas and is now trying to deal with a burgeoning problem in public hospitals. The private hospitals don’t care – the cashless and the uninsured are simply refused treatment.
Barry Kenyon
Pattaya
