Travel Insurance and Coronavirus: All You Need to Know

What is COVID Travel Insurance?

The pandemic saw many countries undergoing lockdown. Incoming foreigners and citizens from coronavirus-affected countries were banned by most governments across the globe, including India, raising a question mark on the pre-booked trips of people in the coming weeks.

Among all this uncertainty, many people turned to travel insurance that covers coronavirus disease and related emergencies. Under this coronavirus travel insurance available, people were again able to travel with a safety net especially when it came to COVID-19-related emergencies including cancelled trips, flight cancellations due to COVID-19 infections, and coronavirus treatment costs and more.

Many Coronavirus travel insurance plans in India include coverage for medical expenses due to COVID-19, quarantine expenses, testing costs and a lot more. You can easily browse these plans on Policybazaar.com to check the ones that work best for your upcoming trip.

Coronavirus Disease and Its Global Impact

Coronavirus disease or COVID-19 is a new strain of virus belonging to the family of coronaviruses (CoV). It originated in China’s Wuhan city that comes under Hubei province and the first case was reported on 31 December 2019.

This disease has never been identified in humans before and is believed to have been transmitted from animals to humans. COVID-19 has an incubation period of up to 14 days with an average of five days. Its shows flu-like symptoms like dry cough, and high fever along with difficulty in breathing, etc.

The coronavirus disease is highly contagious and spread across 169 countries across the globe. The World Health Organisation (WHO) on 11 March 2020 declared coronavirus disease a pandemic.

Several countries such as China, Italy and the US declared a national health emergency during the pandemic. India too put several restrictions on people within the country and its citizens coming from abroad to contain the spread of coronavirus.

Coronavirus Travel Insurance

With the coronavirus pandemic posing serious threats to the global health situation, travellers and the tourism industry is one of the worst affected. The government also put ban international flights coming to India and has issued travel advisories to avoid any non-essential travel abroad.

As a result, travellers were worried about losing money on postponing/ cancelling their trip. Even domestic travellers faced these fears and were unwilling to continue with their trips due to the uncertainty and government advisory to stay home.

This is where coronavirus travel insurance came to the rescue of people who have to delay or cancel their travel. However, when it comes to coronavirus disease there is some relief available through a travel insurance policy.

Trip Delay or Trip Cancellation Due to Coronavirus

It is natural to not want to travel in this uncertain situation. In case the insured traveller is required to delay their trip for a few weeks or cancel the trip altogether due to valid reasons then their losses will be covered by coronavirus travel insurance.

This is because insurance companies in India cover travel delays/ cancellations due to an infectious disease. The claims will be settled as per the terms and conditions of the policy at the time of buying. However, the policy should have been purchased before the government announced travel restrictions due to the coronavirus disease.

Hospitalization Due to Coronavirus

There may be some people who would decide to go ahead with their domestic/ international trip to avoid suffering losses from trip delay or cancellation. But what if they get infected by the COVID-19 disease during the trip? Will coronavirus travel insurance cover medical expenses? Well, the answer is Yes.

Coronavirus travel insurance will cover emergency hospitalization and medical treatment expenses incurred on the treatment of COVID-19 during the trip. Whether it’s a domestic travel insurance policy or an international travel insurance plan, emergency medical expenses will be covered as long as the policy was purchased before the government had imposed travel restrictions due to coronavirus disease. The terms and conditions of the coronavirus travel insurance policy will remain unchanged as were at the time of its purchase.

However, for clarity, insured travellers should check with their insurance provider to know about the cover for quarantine.

Travelling Despite Government Regulation

In case of travel, an advisory is issued for a country the insured traveller is travelling to, if they still go ahead with their trip and face an emergency due to the coronavirus abroad, they will not be covered under the coronavirus travel insurance.

This is because he would be travelling against government advisory and hence would be risking their life. None of the insurance companies will cover the insured taking an intentional risk and thus, they would be responsible for any monetary losses incurred as an outcome.

However, the insured will most likely be covered for any emergency medical expenses incurred because of contracting COVID-19 under the coronavirus travel insurance even if they travel against government restrictions.

Parting Notes

The sudden outbreak of coronavirus disease and its subsequent spread to countries has painted a grim picture at large. In a bid to control its widespread transmission, the government also imposed travel bans discouraging people from travelling abroad, especially to coronavirus-affected countries.

While the world seems to be recovering from the coronavirus pandemic, it is always recommended to avoid travelling unless extremely necessary as the infection is still around. Thanks to the large-scale vaccination drives and social distancing, travelling has been resumed.if you need to travel urgently, make sure to buy the best travel insurance for COVID-19 so that you’re covered at all times.